Sideshow Luiz

C'mon Morata. Get us the 3 points and save us 100M in the transfer market.

I know. But, we needed (just scored) more creativity in midfield, and Kante wasn't even doing the ball winning thing.

Hazard for Willian, Kovacic for Kante.

The scary thing is that the underlying statistics and metrics suggest that they are even better than last year.

If we were Liverpool, they'd be making a big deal about it (they make such a big deal out of the ones that are actually ruled correctly).

After Ox looked like it was going to happen, but went to Liverpool, and he needed to be English. Ox would be really good in this midfield we have right now.

Barkley vs. Pogba:

I know what you meant. I was just overstating how shit that was by picking our lonaees as MOTM.

I thought you meant our players. Those were the only 2 that did anything. Tomori for us, Mount for his team.

I'd say Mount or Tomori.

Wow, this is some shit football on display.

Um, I was late tuning in, WTH happened? 1-1 already?

I've liked this, but I don't like this. If that makes sense.

CHO on the bench? RLC, Kante, Fabregas, and Kovacic? What?

It's gotten better, and I certainly don't think he's at his peak yet, in this role. He has the technical ability and the brain to be able to. He's not as good as Kovacic in an attacking sense, though. Like I've said, different tools for different jobs. the way things are balanced right now, I like it, it's a swiss army midfield.

Not a lot of pace, but he looks like he's got a bit of Pedro's game in him.

Don't get me wrong, I'm totally on board with Kovacic + Barkley against teams that want to sit back. Kante's ability to win the ball back becomes less important when we have 70% of the possession.

I think it depends on the opposition. I think that midfield isn't defensively solid enough against a team like City or Liverpool. In matches like that, it's Kovacic and Kante, for me. Right tools for the right job. Nice to have a hammer and a screwdriver in the tool box.

I keep forgetting that we even have Drinkwater.

I totally get why they are playing (I'm less convinced that any of them are useful on the wing). But, part of why they are playing right now is our schedule. Against top sides, it still has to be Kovacic and Kante, IMO. Against parked busses, I'd go with Barkley and Kovacic right now. Somewhere in the middle is the Barkley + Kante pairing. We'll see what RLC's defensive contribution is like by the end of the season, but as of now, having these 4 makes our midfield very versatile. Cesc may well be gone next summer, so we're looking at these 4 plus Jorginho to take up the 3 starting positions and 2 bench spots which is great, IMO.

Kovacic is the only one out of the 4 midfielders (Kovacic, Kante, Barkley, RLC) that can play both midfield spots (not counting our DLP). If anything, he's kind of the most important piece because he can be on the bench and sub for anyone (probably including Jorginho), or start in either of the 2 advanced midfield spots and the other 3 rotate around him.

If Hazard doesn't renew by January, we should really try to make this happen.

Chelsea's set pieces: https://statsbomb.com/2018/10/examining-chelseas-set-piece-routines/

Stacked. Bosman ruling messed that club up. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-4533326/Ajax-1995-Champions-League-Bosman-dismay.html I knew that they lost some key players due to that, but by 99 they had lost everyone. Davids, Reiziger, Kluivert, Bogarde all gone for free.

He was excellent today. He's a different player playing on the LW.