Jase

Perhaps shouldn't be surprised with that average performance really. About 9-10 players are all second choices at the moment. Most are lacking in match fitness and sharpness and hardly ever played together. It was just more of a functional performance with the players doing enough to get the job done.

It's the Samsung derby mate.

Will be interesting to see how well the team fare collectively tonight. Never played together and most still lacking match fitness and sharpness. Barring Cahill and/or Luiz, doubt anyone else from the starting XI tonight will start at White Hart Lane on Saturday, even if they perform well but will certainly put themselves in good stead to start in the other upcoming games.

Book claims Mou 'cried' at United snub

Whatever we do these days, there will be bad publicity, one way or another. Had we just sold Mata over the summer, there would have been a public outrage from the fans and media as well and probably far more than now. I'm not for one second dismissing the possibility that Mourinho is just wanting to take Mata to the next level with this so called tough love treatment but lets just say if the rumours were true, that Mourinho was actually unsure on Mata and/or he's not his kind of player, he gives him a chance to prove himself. If it works, then good and what Mourinho said about him till now is true. If not, then they have a good reason to sell and that will help alleviate the negative reaction from the fans and media.

Another wide player? Of course! That's just what we clearly need right now because Hazard, De Bruyne, Willian, Schurrle are all rubbish...

Conspiracy? It's a probable situation and only adding further valid reasoning to what Marcotti and TorontoChelsea have already mentioned. Not dismissing the simple case of Mourinho just want Mata to get better but am looking at the other side of the coin as well here.

Roberto Di Matteo and Gus Poyet look set to spurn Sunderland

Will be shown on beIN Sport.

Think the reason we did not sell him was because of this, as ephreak has mentioned here. If anything, it seems that Mourinho is looking for a reason to sell Mata so that it doesn't piss off the fans that much as opposed to him just doing so when he came in. Either that or he did want to sell him but the club prevented him from doing so.

United's worst start in the league in 9 years. No crisis. Chelsea's worst start in the league under Abramovich. Crisis. Go figure..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h4rdy4PC3Ow

I also desperately want to see Mata start at WHL and tear them to shreds again but really, that post is just filled with too much emotional influence. If Mata playing out wide doesn't help out his FB to defend, then that FB would not only get overlapped but also overloaded. You're making it sound so simple and easy thing to do there when it's not. And no one is saying Mata can't defend. It's just that his workrate and defensive work off the ball is not great at all at this point. Like I've been saying, he may do well against Swindon but it doesn't mean he's gonna do the same and do at the consistent level required of him from Mourinho after 1 game when he's still adapting. It takes time and Mourinho will not run the risk in a big away game like that. Had Mourinho wanted to help Mata, keep his spirit up, help the team and all that, would have done so in the past few matches but didn't. He's not gonna go all sentimental and be so easily convinced after just 1 game.

Gabriele Marcotti's take on the Mata situation. http://espnfc.com/blog/_/name/mondaymusings/id/566

Leif. http://forum.talkchelsea.net/topic/16064-benfica-v-chelsea/?p=669191

Playing against Swindon is a different proposition altogether against Tottenham. Mourinho hasn't exactly been playing Mata up till now is because he still wants him to adapt and like I said earlier, playing great against Swindon doesn't mean he has suddenly done that 100%. Jose isn't going to all sentimental and take a risk to play Mata, with his defensive deficiency at this point, to defend against the attacking FB and/or wide players of Spurs. He'll go with the ones that he has the trust now and ones that can do the job like when we play United at Old Trafford. And if Mourinho doesn't want to break Mata's spirit should he play well against Swindon by dropping him out at Saturday, he would have done so with Torres who played decently against Bayern but was nowhere exactly to be seen then with Eto'o coming and straight away taking the ST spot.

He's crazily entertaining though.

Jorge Jesus manhandles the police to defend a pitch invader after Benfica's game yesterday. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJjwXFdG3mI

Not talking specifically about the AMs there, just so happens all our young players in the first team are playing in the AM positions and hence why I cited them. It's just that when things seem to go wrong lately, Mourinho will say he's managing a different profile of players now, he has a set of young players in the team and has to do things a tad more subtle and all that. He just seem to be using that as an excuse be it for his own mistakes or others. Just take his post-match comments after we lost to Basel. He said this squad doesn't have the maturity and doesn't seem to know how to react to pressure. The only actual young players in the starting XI were Van Ginkel, Oscar and Hazard and the rest were all senior and experienced campaigners. How can they, collectively suddenly just lack maturity and lack of the know-how to react to pressure when there were 8 senior players? If the whole squad was filled with like U23 or even U25 players, then I can understand that but at the moment, he has only like 4-5 young players in the team and he's suddenly using the weaknesses, if you can call it that, of those young players to generalize the whole issue with the team right now.

TBH, it's highly unlikely that Mata will start at White Hart Lane this Saturday even if he put in a good/great performance tomorrow. He isn't suddenly just going to get 100% better of what Mourinho demands of him after 1 game and play him in a match where he has to defend against Rose or Walker out wide. If anything it will likely be Schurrle or Willian to start alongside Oscar and Hazard as the trio behind the ST against Spurs. A good performance from Mata will certainly put himself into Mourinho's consideration to start in the other upcoming matches but not at WHL against Spurs.

Maybe. Maybe not. Since that defeat Bury, they've gone 12 games unbeaten at home in all competitions but have only won 6 of those and conceded 9 goals in that run though 5 clean sheets were kept.

Should add in another one. Stoke conceded 3 goals from set-pieces against Arsenal..

His feathers currently aren't soft enough to nurture thos eggs..

Guillem Balague - Juan Mata Will Be a Better Player for Jose Mourinho's Rough Treatment at Chelsea

Why can't it be Steve Holland? It's only 1 game. Surely, you can survive without having a press conference with Mourinho for once?