Jase

What a surprise. Neil Warnock moaned about refereeing decisions...again, for the third straight week.

Gary Neville and Jamie Carragher name Cesar Azpilicueta as top defender on Monday Night Football

I said "play the strongest team possible". Two to three changes are expected but am definitely not championing the idea, like some have suggested, to rest majority of the first team players.

Play the strongest team possible, kill the game off early and then rest the key players. Getting through is one thing but another thing we do not want is us finishing in second place and face Bayern Munich or Real Madrid in the last 16. Would like us to maintain or better, extend the gap on second-placed Schalke before we play them in Germany on matchday 5 because that's not going to be an easy match. We may have thrashed Maribor 6-0 in the previous game but one should also remember that they have taken points of Schalke and Sporting Lisbon, proving they do have quality to trouble opposing teams if they aren't careful.

Erm, you do realize that Pellegrini eventually shut the game out, don't you? He may have brought on Dzeko to go 2 upfront but when that didn't work, he immediately took off Aguero for a defensive midfielder in Fernandinho to try and see the game out, at 1-0 against 10-man United at HOME! TC would probably have turned into a circus if Mourinho did that. Pellegrini's naivety could have so easily cost City had United been more clinical and made better decisions in the final third.

I know Mourinho started the whole debate about the home atmosphere thing but since we now have a separate and specific thread for the discussion, I've moved all related posts to that thread. So, please continue the debate in that thread. Link is below.. http://forum.talkchelsea.net/topic/19202-atmosphere-at-home-games/

And they face West Ham and Southampton next. Ouch!

Don't you tempt fate, Tomo!

Think you're being generous in saying it was a masterstroke to bring Kane on. Any sane manager would introduce him from the bench if they find themselves in the situation Pochettino and Spurs were in then. It was the logical thing to do. Nothing genius or great about. If anything, Pochettino is daft and stubborn for not wanting to play Kane to begin with and continues to persist with Adebayor and/or Soldado upfront.

Spurs were so bloody fortunate against Villa earlier. And Pochettino must be crazy if he thinks anyone is gonna believe him about Spurs being the better side in the game.

Still penalties nonetheless. And even after they went down to 10 men, United looked like they were able to get a draw but let themselves with some horrible finishing and rubbish decision making.

Wonder what the reaction here would have been like if Mourinho decides to do what Pellegrini did in the derby earlier - 1-0 up at HOME against 10-man United and took off 1 striker for a defensive midfielder to shut the game out, rather than going for the kill...

Need statistics? Should have given me a call then. Mata produced 52 assists for us in all competitions during his time here and only 19 of those came from set-pieces. Below is the breakdown of all his assists (Note: The list of assists will begin with matches from the Premier League, then League Cup, FA Cup, Champions League and lastly Europa League): Open Play (33); He assisted: Ramires vs Everton(H) = WON 3-1 Torres vs Swansea(H) = WON 4-1 Lampard vs Arsenal(H) = LOST 5-3 Sturridge vs Wolves(H) = WON 3-0 Drogba vs Newcastle(A) = WON 3-0 Lampard vs Bolton(H) = WON 3-0 Drogba vs Stoke(H) = WON 1-0 Torres vs QPR(H) = WON 6-1 Terry vs Southampton(H) = WON 3-1 Terry vs Fulham(A) = WON 3-0 Hazard vs West Ham(H) = WON 2-0 Hazard vs Stoke(A) = WON 4-0 Lampard vs Villa(H) = WON 8-0 Sturridge vs Spurs(A) = WON 4-2 Hazard vs Norwich(H) = WON 4-1 Ivanovic vs Norwich(H) = WON 4-1 Cole vs Stoke(H) = WON 1-0 Moses vs Leeds(A) = WON 5-1 Hazard vs Man United(A) = DREW 2-2 Ba vs Man United(H) = WON 1-0 Lampard vs Brentford(H) = WON 4-0 Ba vs Southampton(A) = WON 5-1 Ivanovic vs Southampton(A) = WON 5-1 Ramires vs Tottenham(N) = WON 5-1 Malouda vs Tottenham(N) = WON 5-1 Ramires vs Liverpool(N) = WON 2-1 Drogba vs Valencia(H) = WON 3-0 Drogba vs Valencia(H) = WON 3-0 [this is not a mistake; he assisted both goals] Oscar vs Nordsjaelland(H) = WON 6-1 Moses vs Rubin Kazan(H) = WON 3-1 Torres vs Rubin Kazan(H) = WON 3-1 Torres vs Steaua Bucharest(H) = WON 3-1 Torres vs Benfica(N) = WON 2-1 Set Plays(19); He assisted: Sturridge vs Bolton(A) = WON 5-1 Terry vs Wolves(H) = WON 3-0 Luiz vs Man United(H) = DREW 3-3 Ivanovic vs Aston Villa(A) = WON 4-2 Terry vs QPR(H) = WON 6-1 Oscar vs Liverpool(A) = DREW 2-2 Lampard vs Reading(A) = DREW 2-2 Terry vs Liverpool(H) = DREW 1-1 Torres vs Arsenal(A) = WON 2-1 Terry vs Tottenham(A) = DREW 1-1 Cahill vs Man United(H) = WON 5-4 Cahill vs Wolves(H) = WON 6-0 Torres vs Wolves(H) = WON 6-0 Cahill vs Leicester(H) = WON 5-2 Drogba vs Bayern Munich(N) = DREW 1-1 Moses vs Shakhtar(H) = WON 3-2 Cahill vs Nordsjaelland(H) = WON 6-1 Terry vs Steaua Bucharest(H) = WON 3-1 Ivanovic vs Benfica(N) = WON 2-1

Surely Schurrle's are somewhat worse than Willian's?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tvmIEP_BP9Q

Bring back Benitez!

Wouldn't rule him out of going to United...

Maribor lost yesterday, going down 1-0 at home to league leaders Domzale. Now nine points behind first place.

I'm still questioning the point of doing this player ratings. The current MOTM poll works just fine and if members want to rate each player, then they can do it in their post (and some fellas have been doing that anyway). In fact, it's probably better that way as when a member rates a player 6/10, for instance, then we can see why he/she only rated him 6/10 with the explanation, rather than just provide the numbers. It's very hard to implement this idea, apart from the lack of purpose, but you can use the idea KDB suggested above. I doubt that's going to last though.

Mate, I'm not saying he's declining or anything like that. You have misunderstood my point. What I said was, he has always started the season on fire for the past 2-3 campaigns. But after 2-3 months, his form will revert to being normal for pretty much the rest of the season.

Watching that Newcastle v Liverpool game earlier, especially the last 15-20 minutes after Lambert came on was baffling. Rodgers clearly brought him on to go more direct with their attacks, which was fine, but they were completely aimless. The entire team just launched long balls after long balls to Lambert, Balotelli and heck, even Borini and every single time, a Newcastle player cleared the ball away with ease. They had no one close enough to pick up the knock downs or try to contest for the second balls. Nobody was connecting the midfield and attack and defence and midfield. The whole team just became disjointed and like 3 broken parts. Utterly ridiculous!

Best. Interview. Gaffe. Ever. :lol:

So? He will always get 1-2 chances to score from game to game but that doesn't change the opinion on his overall form at the start of the season. Not saying it is bad but it's been happening for 2-3 seasons.