Jase

I don't think Vardy has scored all the goals he has because Leicester play on the counter and it's not as if teams open themselves up and attack Leicester anyway. What Leicester have is that they use Vardy effectively, play to his strengths. He may not be heavily involved in the attacking play etc but when you want someone to score the goals, he's there to put them away.

A draw would have been preferable but I guess a Leicester win is not the worst?

You could have done both side of the views. Praise when it's deserved and criticize when it's deserved. The reason why you get "dogpiled" is because you tend to do the latter way more than the former and you already have a pre-conceived notion about Lampard. So every bad result, every bad performance just become a case of self-fulfilling prophecy.

A manager would still need time to implement a style of play. Now, whether Lampard's style of play is effective or not effective so far is a different debate altogether. Yes but you still turned anyway. The only successful manager available in the summer of 2019 was Allegri but I think he wanted to take a sabbatical and the club were probably done with Italian managers after Conte and Sarri back-to-back. There were no other big name managers out there. I remember we were linked with some underwhelming managers back then and one of them was Javi Gracia, who of course got spanked 7-0 with Watford against Man City in the FA Cup final and then got sacked a few games into the new season last year. So because of what happened in the last 2 games, we should just ignore the good things that happened in other games, in games that we won etc? Yeah and look at some of the underwhelming managers they have appointed recently, especially Barcelona. Madrid went back to Zidane and their results and performances have been inconsistent while also having an ageing squad of sorts. Barcelona, on the other hand, are a mess off and on the pitch. There's a political battle at board level, they have an average and ageing squad of players, their best player wants out and they have a manager, who despite his years of experience, hasn't achieved much at club level outside of the Netherlands. Which of the recent manager at Real Madrid and Barcelona - apart from maybe Zidane - made you go like "wow, they have a top class manager in charge"? You can keep on chopping and changing managers but at some point, you're gonna have to scrap the barrels for whatever average manager that is out there.

No official confirmation yet but Matt Law speculated that James will be out for a few weeks, regardless of whether he goes for surgery or not.

9 subs allowed on the bench and Dele Alli not even on Spurs' against Leicester.

They were used as examples because they were given time to build their squad. They were not used as direct comparison on managerial level to Lampard.

No wonder you always complain. You never even gave him a chance to succeed to begin with. The minute something goes wrong, you will always use it to justify yourself while when things are going well, you do not say much because they do not correspond with your initial feeling. Hope god gives us a manager one day that will win every game, win every trophy to please you to the heaven. You are also missing the point about the comparison with Klopp and Guardiola. They were used as examples because they were given time to build their squad. They were not used as direct comparison on managerial level to Lampard. Not going to sit here and say Lampard will be a great manager because I have also been critical of him and he still has a lot to prove to be one but is it not obvious at the very least that a new, successful team takes time to build - regardless of who is the manager? Ever since Mourinho stepped through the doors in 2004, we always have had a ready made team to win things, with the exception of the 2012 team but even that one took 2 seasons before we won the league etc and this team as well. Just like every other Chelsea fan, am also used to that instant winning feeling but is too much to just have that bit of tiny patience for once? I have no idea whether things will turn out to be good or bad under Lampard because this club in general have been unpredictable for years now but is it hard to just maybe be patient a little? Moreover and while this is no excuse to keep a manager for the sake of it, how often are we going to keep on sacking managers? Every time we have a new manager, people would be like 'yay' but the minute something goes wrong under him, people would be trying to chase him out, people would always complain about something after a while (I may have been guilty of this in the past). This has happened under almost every manager at some point. Do we really want to see it continue? We have chopped and changed the manager every 1-2 years in the last decade. At some point, no top manager would want take this job if they see past managers aren't given time to succeed and will be thrown out of the window the minute something goes wrong. They would rather go to Liverpool, Man City etc knowing they will be given time to succeed there.

Regardless, the gap to the top 4 would only be 2, 3 or 4 points before we kick off tomorrow. Fairly certain your post count is higher after a bad result or when we're on a poor run compared to after a win or when we're on a good run of form.

It was first reported by The Athletic. https://theathletic.com/news/chelsea-reece-james-injury-latest/IZlLqIMxHRMy

How did you get 8 points? If Spurs and especially United win later, they will be at 28 and 26 points respectively and United (or Everton, depending on the GD) will be the one in 4th. We have 22 points now; that's only 4 points behind. I have my doubts about things but this is all very "I told you so!" from you, after a bad result or two, while nothing was really said during the unbeaten run.

But what's the usual points gap between someone in mid-table and someone in 4th? Can't remember the last time we had a season this crazy where only 5-6 points separate the team in 2nd and team in 10th. At worst, we would likely be only 4 points behind the Top 4, which is hardly an insurmountable gap after 14 games, is it? Everton were in 7th a week ago and looked to be in a mess but they're suddenly up to 2nd/into the Top 4 after 3 consecutive wins out of nowhere.

Werner on handling pressure, Premier League vs Bundesliga and a bit on his recent struggles... https://www.chelseafc.com/en/news/2020/12/19/werner-on-performing-under-pressure

Good...maybe you will disappear from here for good. I suppose it shouldn't be a surprise since it's coming from you but one would think this is the 34th league game of the season and not the 14th going by your point about the Top 4.

Nobody wants to remember those 6 months!

You're late to the party. Go to the West Ham match thread.

Is this the first time you're being pessimistic?

I can see Livramento being called to the first team as backup for the upcoming games, if James has to sit out for awhile, but I highly doubt he'll play on Monday when he just played on Friday and not sure if he can just jump from one team bubble to another on such short notice.

IIRC, Gilmour got some stick when Lampard brought him on in that 2-2 draw with Sheffield United last season.

Scary thing is Willian would have stayed had he agreed to a two-year deal OR the club gave him a three-year deal.

In terms of numbers, yes, but nobody is crying out for Willian's "quality".

Pretty sure Klopp has played those "random Liverpool kids no one ever heard of" in cup games before. Also, it's funny how people have been criticizing Lampard and saying this is a must win game but wants to play an 18-year-old in such a high pressure game. If it doesn't work out well and we lose, people will jump even more on Lampard...

And James plays Fabregas-esque passes? No one said anything about Azpi playing Fabregas-esque passes anyway. The passing % doesn't tell anything as well, because someone's can be higher than another person's if the former only passes to a nearby teammate for example or if one takes more risks than the other.