JDY

Giroud is Arsenal's answer to Drogba. Great display.

After listening to the video I'm pretty sure they are saying 'he saw the light' after the first bit Hopefully it catches on!

Straight swap for Mateo Kovacic plz

Money is money, just giving a possible explanation. Maybe no one wants to buy him now?

If he goes on loan and has a good season will we get a bigger fee next year or if we sell now?

Fantastic performance

It was a clumsy tackle. Little disappointed with him but the whole team performance far outweighs one moment of madness for me.

I would usually be annoyed after a loss but that was just fantastic. I can't give the team enough credit for how well they stuck in there, against the best side in the world, with 10 men. To be seconds away from winning must be hard to take for the effort they put in, but win or lose, couldn't be prouder after that. The only one I'm a little disappointed in is Ramires for that tackle. And for anyone wondering why Oscar is starting ahead of Mata in these type of games, that was why. Yes he missed a good chance but other than that it was a phenomenal display.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_lun-5uF_Ps Full Interview

Romania is a bit of travelling but I can't complain about the group overall! Have to laugh at Arsenal though.

The perfect draw so far!!

^ According to Di Marzio Eto'o would be on around £5m for the year + bonuses. I agree that it's a lot but when you take into account he was the highest paid footballer alive, he isn't exactly going to go from that to earning peanuts. RE Didier, wasn't it his decision to leave? For me he left in the perfect way anyway.

People forget that at Inter (especially in his last year), he was one of the most technical and intelligent strikers in football. @TheSkipper also made a similar comment a few pages back. The most popular argument I've seen for people against this signing is that he's older now & therefore his pace will have deteriorated. I don't understand the idea that he relied on pace.

Interview at half 6 on Blues News. Never realised how budget the backdrop was

To me (if true), it seems like we are taking advantage of his low price and hoping to sell on for profit in a few years. Not really any risk.

João Ruela ‏@joao_ruela 1hChristian Atsu (FC Porto) signs for Chelsea, but shall play for other team during this season on a loan. Jose Mourinho's request.

I thought he held the ball well when he got it, but didn't get into positions to receive the ball enough. Whereas Torres was getting in some great positions, but losing it every time

Hopefully we get him in before Bayern.

Will have to wait and see how it plays out. I'm assuming that Andre's workrate and the fact that on the counters he will be a big threat was enough to convince Jose. Can see Schurrle and Oscar doubling up on Carrick.

I'm excited to see what Andre can do up top.

What do you mean by 'fill in all 8'. I'm just saying we need to allocate 8 of the 25 man squad to HG players, like you said earlier.

Indeed, and to comply with the rules we would need to submit 3 of our HG reserve/youth players in the squad (unless Rooney is signed, then 2).

I don't think this is the actual reason why he wants 22 players. Our current squad (excluding Moses & Ba who will likely be sold/loaned) fills up 20 registration places. 5 of these 20 players are homegrown and you need 8 in your 25 man squad. The two signings of Willian & Eto'o (most likely) will take it up to 22, leaving 3 slots left which have to be filled with youth for us to comply with the homegrown rules. Might be just a coincidence but I think it's more to do with that than Mourinho's squad preferences.

In the space of two years we've gone from having Malouda, Benayoun, Kalou, Zhirkov, Anelka (sometimes) as our attacking midfielders/wingers to Mata, Hazard, Oscar, KdB, Schurrle, Willian. Quite ridiculous really. Exciting times ahead.

I haven't seen anyone on here say he's better/as good as Mata & Hazard. I have seen people say that he's better than Hazard for Belgium though, which is true. Maybe like you say you were having a joke but your original post came across to me like you've been waiting for the opportunity to say it. RE Willian, even though we're stacked with attacking midfielders he does bring that bit of dynamism that we've maybe lacked in our build up.