manpe

Irrelevant. Defensively it was our best.

MOTM vote?

Was posting my line-up and realized it was exactly the same as yours. This really should be an opportunity for Cheeks at home to a weak opponent. I can't see him playing any other role than a time-wasting sub at 90+ minutes if he doesn't get significant time here.

Poor Willian, two hard smacks to his face Seemed to have trouble shaking off the last one. Oh and Fabregas was shit, can't remember anything of note other than a tackle on Dembele.

Not gonna happen. Jose recently said he had a different idea to Hazard's of what a no.10 should be. Oscar is the better defender, therefore he will not be preferred in a position with less defensive duty. I thought the team played well defensively, but offensively we were pretty much the same except we did have some sparks, but no end product yet again. The situation where Oscar nutmegged a defender and ran into the box only to end up making a hopeless shot because we didn't have anybody in the box (Hazard was in a bad position), showed that we are better off playing with a natural striker who would make runs into the six-yard-box in cases like these. It's a shame Remy had to be on leave, he's our closest bet to a true non-bib-throwing striker. Begovic saved our ass, as did Lloris for spurs. Both teams had an excellent chance from wonderful crosses, but squandered them. All in all I think a draw was fair, but considering we had significantly more rest and preparation time I am a bit disappointed that we still failed to convincingly grab the game by its neck for extended periods. Could have used Rami, shame about the injury.

Diego not really helping his case here, is he. Expecting Remy or Hazard at no.9 again the next game.

Let's not be defeatist. We need 3pts from every game from now on, a draw isn't an option anymore. Rather lose fighting than draw not even trying.

Good, let that filth stay away from him. He's ours.

Wholly agree Barbara. There is especially one certain privileged member on here who has been antagonizing and provoking others for years, some have got banned due to him. Won't mention any names, no point.

I think Terry's forced sub screwed Cheek's chance. Pedro and Remy obviously came on to preserve Hazard and Willian. I have a feeling he had the same plan with RLC for Fabregas, but it didn't happen. Still, would have been nice to see RLC get his academy day, but I can understand why he didn't.

Yep, he did, I saw that too.

How is the chances created stat put together anyway? If we are talking about real chances, then on the whole the team has created ~5 of them this season so far.

It's a must not lose, then we qualify. This is all you really need to know amidst all this combinations brainfuckery that people are calculating here.

We will win. Begovic Azpi - Zouma - Cahill - Baba Mikel - Matic Willian - Cesc - Hazard Remy

Anybody have a gif/video of the overhead skill he did at one point? I don't remember the minute or anything, but he basically lifted the ball over a defender to retain possession. That was class.

What did Jose tell him in the dressing room? Source of Costa fighting back?

Just goes to show how much we have been lacking quality crossers in the team if people consider this something extraordinary. Those kind of dangerous crosses are a fairly regular thing for top teams except us.

What do you mean? It's Gary more than anybody who can displace JT, Zouma is JT's partner and already ahead GC in pecking order.

Is he a LW or CAM nowadays? Certainly not a centre forward. Actually this is what Torres used to do all the time - hiding and shying away from the box.

I think it was actually 5 or 4 man defence, not 3. Had Norwich played with 5, we would have played with 3. This also explains the inclusion of Ivanovic, who would have slotted in at CB. The choices were logical, hard to argue with that.

You make "multimillion" sound a lot, but it was only £6.3 million. Everybody thought he would be another Piazon who was bought for roughly the same amount and who will never make it here. By that logic Baba should be an undisputed starter and so should have been Filipe Luis. It is peanuts, that kind of price tag doesn't guarantee you a minute and that is especially true in Chelsea, more often than not we dish out those sums for our loan army.

Can't we be happy that we have a young exciting prospect who can play more than one position? That we now have actual proof that Jose is in fact able to surprise us all, something we have been crying out for. That he is using the squad beyond the usual suspects. Since when is it so unusual for wingers to play wing-back anyway? Why all this over-analyzing? The kid got a great experience and we won, so we are ruining him? If anything he earned himself more game time by proving he can be good in more than one position and be useful tactically. The more I think about it, the more I like what Jose did. It was VERY rare for him to make such a call in a premier league must-win game. It also shows that if you're good enough no matter your age, you will play.

After reading Jose's reasoning for this choice I cannot disagree with it. He was using Kenedy as a tactical tool, we won = it paid off. I do however question the decision to play Ivanovic ahead Azpi, but there might have been reasons we don't know of either.

To be fair, that's a fucked up thing to say, to "take advantage".

What do you mean?