OneMoSalah

The thing that has impressed me the most isn't how well he goes forward, unlike the usual traditional flair players he does all the dirty work and he has a good attitude towards it unlike Hazard at the start of last season casually jogging back against Man United, Norwich and other teams when Cole was basically against 2 players at times. Sure you could say thats down to Jose's philosophy/style but I think its more down to the player if I'm honest, he does it a lot better than Hazard, Mata and Schurrle even though they all try to do it as well. Like strike said, I was also quite skeptical and also worried about spending 30m on a player who had played so many years in Ukraine and one year in Russia, he seemed overrated when we first linked with him but hes not. If he can start scoring some goals and getting more assists, the money will have been very well spent. Thank fuck he didn't go to Spurs.

Why Azpi hasn't done anything wrong at LB? In fact he has been better than Cole has there in my eyes.

holy shit no you did not just say that.

Cech Branna Cahill Terry Azpi Rami Mikel Schurrle Oscar Hazard Torres/Ba We need plenty of height in the team especially for defending corners and set pieces from them so thats why I feel Mikel, Schurrle and Torres/Ba would be very useful starters, because of their physical qualities. West Ham will look to probably play without a striker as well with Diame in that false 9 role he's played against Spurs, Swansea and other teams. Will be interesting to see.

If we can sign him and let him play on at Southampton until he is 19 or 20 then very well but still they will demand a lot of money... Paying something 10 million for him and loan him back for a year and a half would be good but they probably won't even accept that.

Zenit aren't going to sell him cheaply, he cost them €40 million. They won't sell him for £10 million or £15 million or even £20 million so it won't happen as Jose won't go and pay something massive like £30 or 40 million on someone who probably isn't worth that. Hes good yeah but fuck paying massive money for him.

Name a goalkeeper who is still playing and has been as consistent as Cech has for the last 10 years in the whole of Europe? There is nobody except Buffon and Casillas who are regarded as the best. He went through a bad period a few years back, like what Joe Hart is going through but he bounced back and in my eyes with Lloris is probably the best keeper in the PL. Sure with Courtois out on loan, any mistake Cech makes people can just say aw sell him and let Thibaut be #1 but still its fucking ridiculous to say so after ONE mistake. Anyway regarding Courtois, he has rejected a new contract apparently as he wants to be #1 next year? Do yous think Cech will be gone next season then or what? I mean the cycle has to come to an end at some point, with a 22(?) year old as good as Courtois we need to let him play sooner or later or he'll leave.

Ok big woop hes scoring goals for his national team..... Torres has won 3 top goal scorer awards for his national team at different competitions still doesn't mean hes worth 50 million. If he was a beast he'd have scored close to 10 or 15 goals already for Monaco. If you can't score a lot of goals in probably the second or third best team in France (with such a creative player like James Rodriguez in your team) where the league lets be honest isn't very competitive who would spend 52 million on you? Nobody.

2 goals in his last 6 games and for £52 million er noooooooooooooo thanks

Apparently Owen Coyle is interested in taking him to Wigan in January on loan.

Happy birthday to TC, and well done to all the admins for all the work they have put in in the last 6 years. Heres to 6 more years

I love Scolari somehow, might bot have worked for him at club level, specially here but hes such a bosssss yay. Scolariiii = god

I need a new toothbrush better make a thread for it.

Aye suppose so. Just right now he won't count, even though hes playing for a country inside the United Kingdom.. crazy..

hahaha we all dream of a team of John Obi Mikels... ok doesn't quite work but I took inspiration from a Rangers chant (we all dream of a team of Davie Weirs') despite the fact Rangers are shitebags as are Celtic as are Hibs and as are most Scottish teams. P.S Your avatar what the fuck is it with you and fucking cats........

I'm pretty sure Feruz won't count as home grown even though he's Scottish. The rule is bullshit, apparently Scots aren't counted as home grown for some reason. Not 110% sure might need to check but I'm certain I read it somewhere.

Just play 11 Lampards and we will win.

I think the 8-0 game vs Villa under Rafa, 4-2 win vs Spurs under Robbie and 3-1 loss at United under AVB have perhaps been the best we've played since 2011. Thats how bad and inconsistent we've really been at times in terms of performances. I'll take winning football over attractive football but you'd think with 150-200m worth of attacking players and Jose Mourinho we'd be winning games easily playing attractively or not. Sure Jose prefers defensive stability over going gun ho but with Mata, Hazard, Oscar, Willian, Ramires, Schurrle, de Bruyne, Eto'o, Torres and Ba you'd think we'd be able to score a lot of goals in games and win them no? Pivots a problem too but I'd prefer we sorted the performances of some of our players first.

Mikel, de Bruyne, whoever I don't necessarily care because I'd prefer to see someone else play there as Lampard is in really bad form right now and doesn't suit that position.

Bertrand is another good shout and for an attacking sense I agree that he should be playing at LB as he can support Hazard/Schurrle but so can Azpi, just against Schalke and West Brom I noticed that he was always tucking in at times so we were defending very narrow, probably tactical instructions more than anything though. He can get forward at times to, just he comes onto his right foot as he prefers it but I agree that Bertrand should get a chance at LB too.

We lacked his off the ball runs against West Brom. Hazard is a better dribbler but he still doesn't look to make penetrable runs in between the full back and center back like Schurrle does. I like how a lot of German players who play on the wings look to get into these positions, running between the full back and center back to try and get into scoring positions. Perhaps you don't think its much but its something that only Schurrle seems to do regularly in our team. Even if he doesn't get the ball if he makes the run he takes an opposition player with him or opens up space.

He can have as much as he wants, can't put a price on winning the CL. Even though thinking that Robbie was making £130k per week is crazy, I doubt Mourinho is even on something significantly more than that.

Does anyone think Azpi looks a bit bigger or bulkier in comparison to last year? Anyway, he's been excellent at LB and long may he continue there until Cole gets the finger out. Like Mata he seems to be using his weaker foot much more often too, see he has tried to improved himself a lot by the looks of it physically and technically. Hopefully he'll get a turn at RB at some point too, he's been excellent in the 2 games at LB though.

Surprised Phil Driver hasn't asked the BBC can he vote for Lampard yet.

Hes hardly wasting his career away, hes a young lad who still needs to work hard, adapt to a new system, a different philosophy, a new mentality and wait his chance. This isn't Belgium and no disrespect to the Belgian national team here but they don't have a better wide right sided player than Kevin de Bruyne. He will always be picked for Belgium, hes got to hit that next level to be a regular at Chelsea. Leaving Chelsea on a permanent basis just because hes not getting games despite not being the best here would show one thing I think, that he isn't up for fighting for a place in the team even though he has openly said he is willing to. Jose wouldn't have kept him if he felt he wasn't useful, there will be injuries and suspensions where he will end up featuring. He hasn't fully adapted to the Prem I think, hes looked off the pace ever in all games he has played against English opposition except for maybe 20 minutes against Hull but they weren't in the game at all. Sure its hard to build up momentum when you're playing once every while but still, this is a massive club with massive resources, take your chance when you get it and you'll be in the team. Hasn't happened for him yet. Bit premature to say he should be sold because he can't get ahead of Mata, Oscar, Schurrle, Hazard, Willian... hes done very little in his career but he still has plenty of time.