Jase

Last 9 games (all under Tuchel) - 10 goals in 9 games Last 9 games under Lampard - 15 goals in 9 games, including the 7 scored against Morecambe and Luton If we take the FA Cup games (Morecambe, Luton, Barnsley) games out, then it's... 9 goals in 8 games under Tuchel 8 goals in last 7 games under Lampard If only league games are considered... 8 goals in 7 games under Tuchel 8 goals in last 7 games under Lampard

Abraham under Tuchel: Wolves - 13 mins appearance as sub Burnley - Subbed off at HT Spurs - Unused sub Sheffield Utd - Unused sub Barnsley - Played full 90 mins; scored a goal Newcastle - 20 mins appearance as sub Saints - Subbed off at HT Atletico - Unused sub Man Utd - Not selected in matchday squad The beginning of the end?

Kante-Kovacic axis perfect for snuffing out Chelsea’s dangerous opponents https://theathletic.com/2417398/2021/03/01/kante-kovacic-axis-perfect-for-snuffing-out-chelseas-dangerous-opponents/ For a frantic few seconds in the 90th minute of a match that had felt destined to end goalless for the best part of an hour, the door blew wide open for Manchester United to hand Thomas Tuchel his first defeat as Chelsea head coach. Reece James’ deep free kick overran a crowded United penalty area and was gathered up by Aaron Wan-Bissaka, who slipped it infield to Fred. As he did so, Marcus Rashford, Daniel James and Scott McTominay turned on the turbo boosters one final time to join substitute Anthony Martial in racing upfield. One incisive pass later, Chelsea were faced with a nightmare transition attack from arguably the most dangerous counter-attacking team in the Premier League… … until N’Golo Kante shut the door, flicking McTominay’s low cross away from Martial, behind Rashford and James and out of Chelsea’s penalty area to safety. Rather than a dramatic late winner for United, it became just the latest addition to a unique career showreel of potentially decisive moments that never actually happened because of his presence. Kante looked like Kante again on Sunday, restored to the “double six” role that saw him scale Premier League-winning heights in back-to-back seasons with Leicester City and Chelsea. He led his team in tackles (seven) and interceptions (four), playing a key role in limiting United to less than a handful of good counter-attacking opportunities at Stamford Bridge. In partnership with Mateo Kovacic, he also provided the foundation for Tuchel’s side to dominate possession against opponents determined to disrupt their passing rhythm. Kante touch map vs Man Utd He might not have admitted so afterwards, but Tuchel was clearly surprised by the aggression of United’s pressing. Had he anticipated their desire to push so high up the pitch in a bid to force Chelsea mistakes close to their own goal, there is no way that he would have left Timo Werner and Christian Pulisic on the bench in favour of an attack totally devoid of speed or vertical running. In the event, United’s high defensive line made Olivier Giroud isolated and virtually redundant for long spells, while Hakim Ziyech and Mason Mount had to make do with more compressed pockets of space. United’s pressing succeeded in throwing Chelsea out of their normal game; in the first half they had a mere 50.7 per cent of possession, which would have been comfortably their lowest share in any of Tuchel’s seven Premier League matches in charge. The main reason the visitors’ unexpected strategy didn’t cause more damage was the effectiveness of Kante, working in tandem with the excellent Mateo Kovacic, at maintaining midfield control under severe pressure and stifling the vast majority of opposition attacks at source. Before it was brought back by Tuchel against Southampton, the Kante-Kovacic central midfield pairing hadn’t been seen since Chelsea’s disastrous first half against West Brom at The Hawthorns in September. Yet from the opening minutes against United there were signs of an improved understanding between the two men, primarily in terms of their positioning within the team’s broader tactical structure. They were almost always in close enough proximity to support one another in winning the ball and using it to get Chelsea on the front foot. Here, as Andreas Christensen shapes to dink the ball out to Callum Hudson-Odoi from inside his own six-yard box, Kovacic and Kante are next to each other and primed to help the team play around United’s press: Kovacic receives the ball from Hudson-Odoi, draws in Bruno Fernandes and then plays it to Kante… … who then slips a pass beyond Fred into the stride of Hakim Ziyech, ready to lead a Chelsea counter-attack: In the second half Chelsea’s share of possession went up to 63.3 per cent. That was partly due to the intensity of United’s press dropping off a little, but it was also because Tuchel’s side did a better job of winning and keeping the ball higher up the pitch. Once again, Kante and Kovacic worked well together to make this possible. Here, Kovacic opts to go to ground to try to win the ball from Rashford, while Kante stands poised for the second ball: It bounces loose to McTominay who tries to play it forward first time, but Kante pounces upon it and gets Chelsea on the front foot again with a progressive pass out to the left flank: Late in the game, Kovacic again presses to win the ball, this time from James. He cushions it back to McTominay, who looks to move it quickly forward to the feet of Martial: Kante anticipates the pass and leaves Fernandes to go and cut it out, ending a United counter before it has a chance to gain momentum: Kovacic has an excellent understanding with Jorginho too, and Tuchel has built most of Chelsea’s early performances — including the signature win over Atletico Madrid — around their passing combinations and possession instincts. That decision has sat rather awkwardly with his repeated gushing praise of Kante in public, describing the France international as a world-class water-carrier and insisting that he has wanted to coach him for years. Perhaps we will see Tuchel start all three at some stage but, as long as he remains committed to the “double six”, he will face a difficult selection decision that goes to the heart of this team’s identity. It seems obvious that Kante-Kovacic has more to offer Chelsea defensively, purely by virtue of having Kante in it. In the first 10 minutes against United, he helped stifle this hugely promising counter-attack… … by slowing down Rashford, denying him a clear path to goal and ultimately forcing him to attempt a difficult pass through for Mason Greenwood that Ben Chilwell intercepts: In the second half he had a similar effect without ever touching the ball, confronting Fernandes on the halfway line and compelling him to hit an early pass towards Rashford that didn’t find its target: Equally, the Jorginho-Kovacic midfield axis is probably a little more useful when it comes to meeting Tuchel’s most urgent need. Chelsea are less than thrilling to watch right now because they have control without much in the way of creation. There is plenty of cause to be optimistic that this problem could be solved with a little more collective chemistry and training time, both of which have been in desperately short supply during this unique season. Until then, Tuchel will have to be content with the control he has brought to this Chelsea team — and in the Kante-Kovacic midfield pairing, he appears to have found another option to help tame more dangerous opponents.

Yup, there seemed to be less furore about those incidents than yesterday's penalty incident...because Man United were the victims. What a surprise!

How is the price very high? 🤣

Of course his total now is bloody disappointing or if one were to just look at the overall come end of the season but the point here is the context of that interview. And we also don't know if he's going to play every remaining league game either, especially if we go deep in the Champions League and FA Cup. I feel like I should point something out regarding that but I best not speak...

How is it selective when by the time Lampard came in, Alonso had played in a back 4 for an entire season? How is it selective when selected as a LB under Lampard, Alonso was consistently dropping clangers? If I'm being selective, it's because there's already a big sample size of Alonso playing as a LB in a back 4 compared to Chilwell playing as a LWB in a back 3 now at the club. That's very debatable to say the least.

IIRC, we once fucked up a 4 v 1 counter at Man City a few years ago.

Our record against Solskjaer's United... L 0-2 (FA Cup) D 1-1 (PL) L 0-4 (PL) L 1-2 (Carabao Cup) L 0-2 (PL) W 3-1 (FA Cup) D 0-0 (PL) D 0-0 (PL) 🤢 As bad as Conte's run of results against Wenger's Arsenal!

See my reply to you in the Ziyech thread.

Did De Gea really have to do anything special to save that? Ziyech's shot was pretty much straight at him or well within his comfort range. He should have scored especially it was on his left foot. Great...so now you're saying we have playerS that are suited to face one type of teams here and another type of teams there? Apologies if I'm being rude but I can't help but laugh at the irony of people saying Werner should have started today after seeing calls for him to be dropped before the game. It's hilarious! The thing about today's game is that United may have decided to press high after seeing our starting front 3. Giroud doesn't have any pace to run in behind while Mount and Ziyech like to come onto the ball or receive the ball onto their feet. They aren't off the ball runners. Had say Werner started, would they have just sat back, as we expected them to, or would they have still pressed high up? If he had started and United just defended deep and he did nothing, people would then be complaining about him starting again. On Ziyech, how much of his second half performance was down to United suddenly deciding to not press high and sit deeper? Because he wasn't the only one who struggled in the first half and then suddenly looked better in the second half. Also I suppose if we want to make good use of Ziyech, then we also need to play him with the off the ball runners to get on the end of his passes. There was literally no one making those off the ball runs when he played today.

We can argue all day and will likely never agree on this but I'll just say this, since we're talking about a conventional LB being asked to play in a slightly unfamiliar role of a LWB, maybe some slack should be given especially when said player has only played 1 game here and 1 game there? Even Tuchel has pointed this out and I don't think Chilwell has been a complete disaster in the LWB role either. If Tuchel wanted to rest Alonso, why didn't he just do it against Southampton last weekend? Or given we have a decent amount of rest days between Atletico and United (4) and United and Liverpool (3) games, why didn't Tuchel just play him today and say rest him against Everton? I didn't say I expected more from Kante with his passing apart from just being more careful with it. We had no real control in the first half because United decided to press us and they disrupted us well. Jorginho won't have made a difference considering he's bad when under pressure. Getting pressed and losing control of games have been a long standing problem with us, even when we had Fabregas in the team. We don't have a team filled with players who are comfortable on the ball when under pressure. Then what's your thinking behind Tuchel not playing Jorginho today then? Atletico only mostly pressed well in the first 10 minutes or so but apart from that, they were mostly content to sit back and defend with the 6-3-1 shape. Kante came on after Giroud scored to help manage Atletico's attacks. Kante only just came back from injury during that Spurs game period and hence why he didn't start. Jorginho-Kovacic worked well in that game's first half because Spurs were just so passive and sat off us. But when they decided to press high up in the second half, we lost control of the game.

Different teams and all but watching us play the back 3 now feels so awkward compared to when we played the back 3 under Conte. We have such a mish-mash of a squad and Tuchel has gone with a system/formation that suits some players and doesn't suit others. Feels like it has benefitted Alonso, Rudiger, Christensen and Azpi more than anyone else.

United have more pace in their team...? Going forward, I don't even think Jorginho's absence made much of a difference considering we barely created much.

Yes, I noticed but given United's threat on the counter, it's bloody obvious why Kante started ahead of Jorginho, who is NOT reliable defensively.

You mentioned Chilwell taking people on but does Alonso do that? An example of having someone quicker is the ball that he ran onto to create the opportunity for Ziyech in the second half (he should have scored). How often do you see Alonso being able to just simply outpace someone and then play a ball or create a chance for someone? If Alonso is really Tuchel's first choice or he's as great as you're making him out to be, then why didn't he just start Alonso for this big game?

By the way, you come at me on the Alonso-Chilwell selection but thought Jorginho would do well today, especially against United's pressing in the first half. Would have likely ended up with more turnovers and less defensive protection!

Last 7 league results against United... L 1-2 D 2-2 D 1-1 L 0-4 L 0-2 D 0-0 D 0-0 No win since that Morata header in November 2017!

LET'S WIN THE CHAMPIONS LEAGUE!

Tuchel said it was a tactical sub and because of the injury.

We can argue till the cows come home on this but I really don't see what Alonso does that is so WOW that he should be the undisputed starter. Let's not make as if I have anything against Alonso the person/player. If he had any pace, mobility, agility in him, I wouldn't be sitting here and arguing so much about this. We are the only top side around obsessed with such a slow FB/WB to begin with and would you have complained much at all had we sold Alonso in the summer or in January?

I don't know if anyone here even bothered to read/watch his full interview to get the context. He basically meant after all the ups and downs this season, if he can get to 10 league goals now, he would be happy with the return especially in his first season. Otherwise in a normal season and/or future seasons, I can't imagine he would be happy with it given he regularly got into double figures every at Leipzig, regardless of whether it's the Bundesliga or not.

But it doesn't make much sense to have Emerson AND Alonso on the bench?