Jype

Quite surprised no one has Ba in their preferred starting lineups. Was great yesterday and in my opinion did more to deserve a start here than Torres did. Ba Hazard - Mata - Schürrle Mikel - Ramires Azpi - Terry - Cahill - Ivanovic Cech

Great result from a hard match. Team responded magnificently in the second half and Mourinho bringing on Ba to play up front together with Torres worked wonders. Sunderland, Stoke and Crystal Palace coming up next. If we win all three we'll most likely be on top by the time we face Arsenal because at least some of our rivals are guaranteed to lose points when they play each other. Arsenal have Hull, Everton and Manchester City as their next three league fixtures and Hull showed today against Liverpool that they won't just bend over and accept defeat when a big team comes to visit. My thoughts exactly.

Have you even seen what Joachim Löw has been saying about Schürrle recently?

It's the Southampton fans making all the noise...

The overreaction is strong with this one.

Ramires is hardly playing as a winger. It's more like Essien, Ramires and Lampard in midfield with Hazard and Mata behind Torres. Good decision in my opinion because their midfield has completely overrun ours and something needs to change. Could use some more width though but with Mata playing that's not really possible if Jose wants to have any chance of winning the midfield battle. Maybe Schürrle or Willian for Mata in the second half?

Decent. Was hoping for Schürrle instead of Oscar who has looked tired lately but other than that I'm mostly happy with the lineup. Maybe I would've benched Iva and Ramires too after their performances against Basel but I trust Jose to have made absolutely certain that slacking off like that isn't acceptable and hopefully they'll bounce back now.

Thumbs up for Agent Victor. :blue scalf:

most of them jump anticipating a normal kick. He probably knew that. Seen numerous free kicks like that scored against United, they only have themselves to blame if they're found out but still keep doing the same mistakes.

Well, he's not that far behind and is a few years younger too. And who cares if Falcao is slightly better? It's not like the level of a player really matters that much when both can easily be described as world class and I would say getting Lewandowski on a free transfer will be a hundred times better deal to whoever gets him (Bayern) than buying Falcao from Monaco for £50m.

The philjones never gets old.

After two really bad rounds I've now got a decent start to this one. Three players (Lukaku, Ramsey, Coleman) have featured so far and I will have 34 points once the bonuses are added. Got some deadwood in the starting lineup though, so aside from Aguero, Suarez and maybe Hazard I'm not a expecting lots of points tomorrow.

Yup, no doubt Willian is a great player and on his own maybe even worth the money spent on him, but is he really that much better than De Bruyne to warrant the £30m fee as well as making way for him by selling a quality player we already had for way below his value?

You serious? Using Kevin De Bruyne as an example of 'wasted money' is fucking ridiculous. He had a wonderful loan spell last season at Werder Bremen and in the last transfer window he could have been sold to the Champions League finalists for over twice the amount of money the club bought him for back in 2012 but instead Jose decided to give him a chance in the first team. In hindsight he should have been loaned out again or even sold if the plan was to buy yet another expensive AM and make KdB sit in the stands all the time but if anything, spending £30m on an unnecessary player like Willian when we already had De Bruyne is something that can be classified as wasted money. Not only did he cost the club £30m, his arrival also made sure De Bruyne's market value is currently nowhere near the heights it was last summer and if we sold the Belgian now after six months of doing absolutely fuck all on the football pitch we'd be lucky to get €10m, which for a player of his quality is a bargain to whoever buys him. And what about Courtois, is he another one of Emenalo's pointless U20 signings? Cost the club a mere £8m and is undoubtedly one of the best goalkeepers in the world already and either a future number one keeper at Chelsea or perhaps the world's second most expensive goalkeeper ever if he's sold. You win some, you lose some and hitting the jackpot from time to time like with Courtois has the potential to make this system profitable and even the ones who don't make it can still be sold for decent transfer fees to lesser clubs.

What I'm hoping to see: Torres Hazard - Mata - Schürrle Essien - Mikel Cole - Terry - Cahill - Azpilicueta Cech Ramires, Lampard and Ivanovic deserve to be dropped after their performance against Basel and Oscar could use a rest. Cahill should be among the dropped too but it's not like we have any other options at the moment with Luiz injured so I guess he'll have to keep playing unless Mourinho is ready to make a point by giving a chance to either Kalas or Ake. Schürrle was very impressive back in October but hasn't played much since due to minor injuries so now could be a good chance to play him again.

As usual, people are making this a way bigger deal than it really is. I see Mourinho's comments as nothing more than a friendly reminder to Lukaku that he should think twice about what he says to the media. In the past, even before Jose's arrival and the Everton loan, Lukaku has occasionally been a bit immature and naive with the way he has spoken to the media, making a lot of fans and maybe even some people in the club's boardroom question his attitude so now Mourinho has given him a clear message that he needs to cut the bullshit and grow up if he wants to return to Chelsea one day. If Lukaku is a top professional like I've always considered him to be he will not get butthurt over Mourinho's comments and instead tries to learn something from this. If it works and Lukaku learns his lesson, Mourinho has done the right thing here but if it doesn't and Lukaku starts to resent Mourinho so easily then he really is still an immature kid who maybe isn't ready to lead the line for us after all, which is something Mourinho will be happy to know when making his plans for next season.

Yup, at the very least we should be looking to make a decent profit on him in a few years if he continues his rapid development but for one reason or another never makes it at Chelsea. Two Hazards tearing teams up together for club and country would be something though...

The performance was horrible but not too concerned about the result itself. Sure it would have been good to get the point because with Schalke drawing at Steaua it would have meant us sealing the first place in the group but we’re through anyway and only need a point at home against Steaua two weeks from now to guarantee the first place so it’s really not such a big deal. It was obvious that for Basel this was a life or death kind of match because now they are only a point away from qualifying to the knockout stages but our players couldn’t be bothered. Not giving a fuck is of course unacceptable and all that but I’m glad we slipped up here and not against West Ham last Saturday.

Lucky to stay level, Mourinho seriously needs to use the hairdryer in the dressing room or we'll lose. Lampard should be taken off after the break, been fucking shocking today and clearly not fit to play 90 minutes two times a week anymore. Maybe give a chance to De Bruyne?

Schwarzer, Cole, Mata, Hazard, De Bruyne, Schürrle, Torres That bench is just ridiculous.

Not bad. Was hoping for Schürrle and Willian to start on the wings but I'll take that too. 3-0, Willian to score two and Oscar the other.

Well, Balotelli at 23 has already played for clubs like Inter, Manchester City and Milan so he definitely looks set to follow in Zlatan's footsteps as a player who moves a lot. With Milan's mediocre start to the season Raiola has reportedly started touting Balotelli to clubs such as Chelsea or Real Madrid so it wouldn't surprise me at all if he moved away from Milan by next summer at the latest. Anyway, it's still way too early to tell whether or not Pogba will go down that road too. At the moment I don't see why he'd leave Juve anytime soon.

All these 'problematic' players such as Zlatan, Balotelli and Pogba have one thing in common and that's their agent Mino Raiola. I don't believe for a second they're as bad as people think they are, it's just the agent whispering things in their ear in an effort to get their clients what they rightfully deserve. Can you honestly say that Pogba demanding more playing time before committing his future to Man United was somehow uncalled for? His quality was there for everybody to see and he should have been given a proper chance because it's not like United's midfield was filled with quality players at the time but instead Ferguson opted to bring Scholes back from retirement in the middle of the season so Pogba and Raiola decided it's better for his career that he leaves. Don't know about you but I like players who are ambitious that way and aren't just happy to collect the paycheck and waste their careers away by sitting in the stands when they know they're good enough to play week-in week-out for a top club.

It doesn't matter if Dortmund accept an offer if the player refuses to move. He has his mind set on Bayern and surely their contract offer can't be that much worse than the 'irresistible' offers he would get from teams like Chelsea or Real Madrid in January because he holds all the cards here and can pretty much name his price and Bayern will be happy to agree as they'll still get a huge bargain by getting one of the best players in the world on a free transfer. Time to move on and only consider this guy again if something really unexpected happens, for example Guardiola suddenly changing his mind about getting him.

That makes perfect sense, you are a genius. Hazard can destroy Champions League quality sides like Bayern Munich and Schalke but can't do it on a rainy day at Hull because their players are 'bigger'.