Jase

Stoke City vs Chelsea POST-MATCH DISCUSSION AND ANALYSIS Barclays Premier League 12th January, Saturday 2013 Britannia Stadium 15:00 Kick Off (UK time)

After yesterday, Swansea's record against London opponents this season in all competitions reads - P8 W5 D2 L1. This is the 4th home game out of 6 under Benitez that we have failed to score.

Had Mata and Ramires took the chances that came their away in that first half, this game would have ended totally different. Instead, one shot poorly at the keeper while the other tried to be too clever and walked the ball into the net!

Only a remote? Not a TV too??

WTF is with managers always making a change so late in the game?! His timing in making substitution is arguably even worse than RDM's! Against QPR, we hardly looked like scoring and he brought on Mata in the 73rd minute. Only 17 minutes to make a difference. Today, we need a goal and Ba to come on. What did Benitez do? He brought him on in the 80th minute! How on earth does he expect him to make a full impact with just 10 minutes left?! Heck, even the first change came after the 70th minute!!

That's the thing I don't get tonight. Why on earth did Benitez deployed him as a winger on the right flank?! He's not a winger FFS!! At the rate we're going, I'll probably prefer to have RDM back and go with his gung-ho playing style than this atrocious playing style. Feels too rigid and structured!!

Yeah...Swansea practically did what we did to Barcelona.

Disappointed with Ivanovic tonight. Of all people to be making mistakes, never expected him to have done so, especially when those mistakes are such schoolboy errors!!

Looks like the League Cup is gonna be the 5th trophy we're gonna throw away just like that this season! This is getting absolutely depressing and embarrassing!! Also, Stamford Bridge is slowly turning into a fortress for away teams. Have lost that aura and fear factor. So far in 6 home games under Benitez in all competitions, we have won 2, drawn 2 and lost 2 as well as failing to score in those 4 matches!!

For all the brilliance of Mata, I sometimes just can't help but to get frustrated at him for missing those bloody easy goalscoring chances! Mata's horrendous miss earlier in front of the goal reminded me of the one squandered against Liverpool!

RAFA OUT!!!

I don't think Benitez likes to play Mata, Oscar and Hazard behind the ST. It leaves the squad unbalanced and it might be problematic when it comes to defending, as we have seen in the past. He has only started those 3 once so far IIRC, and that was in his first game in charge against Man City.

That would mean Villa have to win by 3 goals within the 90 minutes in the 2nd leg to progress OR win by 2 goals to at least take the tie to extra time, right??

Wonder what are the odds of us bottling this, having already done so with the last 3 competitions this season.

Think Marin is likely to start. We don't have much options out wide now with Moses having already gone to the AFCON. And think Rambo makes a decent point anyway. Marin obviously needs more game time to get his confidence going and getting into full flow. He's already playing catch up to the others in terms of proving his worth and trying to cement a spot in the starting XI.

Nice bit of interview this.

That was the last thing I heard too with Malaga keen on inserting a region of 40m release clause in his contract.

http://metro.co.uk/2013/01/08/chelsea-and-tottenham-suffer-isco-setback-with-malaga-unwilling-to-sell-3343338/

Apart from Daily Mirror, did the Spanish media actually report anything about this over the weekend? Have yet to see any real concrete sources linking us to getting Isco.

That! Doubt Benitez will throw Terry straight into the starting XI having just returned from a long lay off and especially when we are away at Stoke this weekend. Not the ideal game and place to be starting him immediately.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n5auZHYm6WA

Nice to smash teams like that 6-1 and 8-0 but not much point of winning games like that if we can't beat others at the Bridge. We probably have overused the goalscoring quota in those 2 matches. We failed to score in the other 3 games!

Our record under Benitez at the Bridge haven't exactly been impressive - P5 W2 D2 L1. Two of those wins have come against Nordsjaelland and Aston Villa. Away from home, it's a different matter altogether - P8 W6 L2. Overall, P13 W8 D2 L3.

At this rate, FIFA should just award the next 10 years of Ballon d'Or awards to Messi in advanced to save everyone's time. Have a runners up trophy for everyone else to compete.

Just played a game on FIFA with Chelsea against Swansea. Won 2-0 and Torres scored both goals.