Strike

you are using double standards to compare Pellegrini and Moyes in cup competitions. Why ridicule Pellegrini's lack of cup success when Moyes hasn't won anything of note in his career? Pellegrini took Villarreal to the Champions League Semis and Malaga to the Quarters and finished 2nd in the La Liga. Here is Moyes' Cup summary. Moyes' record in UEFA Competitions is poor. In 4 attempts, Furthest he has reached in the UEFA Cup is the Round of 16 . His record in the FA Cup is slightly better but very overrated. In 11 seasons at the club, Moyes' Everton have thrown away SEVEN ties when drawn at home in the FA Cup. To his credit, Everton have reached the Quarters twice, Semis once and the final once but bottled it each time. The League Cup is even worse. 11 seasons and apart from 2 semifinals, Everton have never gotten past 4th round.

Yes. Ofcourse it counts as experience! They say 'What doesn't kill you, only makes you stronger'. A classic example is AVB's work at Spurs where he has clearly benefited from his mistakes at Chelsea. AVB has admitted that himself. You had a problem with Pellegrini winning only 1 Intertoto Cup in Europe but Moyes' biggest achievement is winning the 2nd division with Preston. He hasn't won any title of note. Everton qualified for CL once but was beaten home and away by Pellegrini's Villarreal in 2005. Double standards? Age may favour Moyes but Managers tend to go as long as till age 65-70. We are not looking at the incoming manager to pull a Fergie but get us through the next 3-4 years. English-Player Bias is overrated. Chelsea have been a team with a heavy foreign flavour since the 90's and you only need to look at Liverpool to see where English-youngsters take you. Admittedly, Moyes has cultivated good young talent over the years but at Chelsea he will not get that time to put faith in the youngsters. In Mourinho's run, we barely had any academy products coming through. Your other points supporting Moyes read like personal preference - 'I saw heart in the team's performance yesterday' - the same could be said for Malaga vs Dortmund. In the end, It's personal preference really. You like Moyes. I like Pellegrini but I will argue that Pellegrini is ahead of Moyes in terms of overall value. Moyes' main problem is lack of experience. He has zero experience of a title race, barely any experience in the Champions League (never made it to the groups) and zero experience of a big transfer budget. Don't get me wrong, I do think he's a good manager but he needs a run at a goodish team like Spurs before staking a claim for the Chelsea job.

improvement on our DM's? @,

The purpose of this article is to make a case for Pellegrini. That is why I chose Not to focus on his 'lack of English experience'. He's fluent in English and knows from his time at Real that he should get results soon.'Lack of English experience' shouldn't take precedence over his coaching ability. You cannot just say that a manager with English experience will be better than foreign manager without taking into account coaching ability, results and experience. Also, you've avoided my question - Who do you think should be the new manager outside Jose and unrealistic people like Klopp, Loew etc?

CL experience. Experience with big transfer budgets. Villarreal and now Malaga is a higher level than Everton. Moyes has had the comfortable backing of his chairman so far and the situation at Chelsea is completely different - Pellegrini is no stranger to our situation. His work at Villarreal and Malaga is much greater than Moyes' work at Everton - case in point, Villarreal finished 2nd - 10 points ahead of Barca in 08' to add to the CL runs.

This from the Telegraph " the Chilean is a disciplinarian with a commitment to attacking football, he can deal with big-name players and speaks fluent English"

Point noted. But why should it undermine the rest of the points? This is why I think the 'lack of English experience' won't be a big issue - He has vast experience - over 25 years - He's a seasoned tactician in the La Liga - unlike Scolari who managed a lot of South American and Middle-Eastern teams and he is also well versed in English He has dealt with big transfer budgets at both Real and Malaga. You are focussing on lack of English experience but i don't think it can be held against him as much as other managers like say, AVB or Scolari. Moreover, if we are restricting our manager search to England - the best available manager is David Moyes - and I know for certain that Pellegrini is a much better coach than Moyes. Who do you think should be the new manager outside Jose and unrealistic people like Klopp, Loew etc?

Completely agree but I'm talking about a scenario where Jose did not accept Chelsea offer. Then I wouldn't mind Pellegrini All these years we had player-stability. the same core group of players who were all borderline World-Class but now we are rebuilding and the whole process has to start again. If we get Jose, we suddenly go from the 3rd best team in England to 'one of the top 3' in England. Jose should be first-choice no doubt and you would have a hard time finding someone who will argue with that but there are potentially lot of pitfalls to Jose coming and we need to brace for possibility of a backup

So you're saying - Mourinho or bust then. edit: Ancelotti did well. He counts as a manager who lasted two whole years and did well here. Pellegrini could also do the same

yeah but it becomes irrelevant when we can't get Mourinho or Guardiola. among the rest, no-one will have any control here and Pellegrini is a good coach as you said. Who do you think should be the manager if Jose doesn't come? edit: btw, i am saying Pellegrini ONLY if Jose doesn't come. Not sure I made that clear

it's irrelevant. No one other than Jose, or maybe Pep, can hold the board by the balls. the rest of the managers HAVE to start well here

he's not any random new guy as well. unlike Avb, he has been around a long time. he's a proper manager. also, with our old guard close to accepting that their place in the team is gone, Pellegrini should have it easier

Looking beyond Mourinho While Chelsea fans savour the prospect of club legend Jose Mourinho returning to the club next season, it won’t be the end of the world if he doesn’t eventually come to Stamford Bridge. After all, almost all of the Mourinho rumours have been reported by far-from-credible news outlets like the Daily Mail and the Daily Star. Moreover, some reports have gone on to wildly suggest that Mourinho will bring Cristiano Ronaldo with him to Stamford Bridge. If that’s not lazy journalism, I don’t know what is. Most of these reports seem more like guesswork on the part of the media rather than cold hard facts. Mourinho’s daughter goes to school in London and the next day the papers print a news item which has as much substance as Ray Wilkins’ hairline. Jose has a contract with Real and as much as it looks like he’ll be leaving Madrid this summer, there’s no guarantee that he’ll end up at Chelsea. Paris or Manchester could be a tempting offer for ‘The Special One’ or he could take a break from the game altogether. Ofcourse, if Jose accepted Chelsea offer then the board should hire him on the spot but it would be wise for us fans to cool down the Jose talk until credible sources report it and brace for the worst-case scenario. Apart from Mourinho, Chelsea don’t exactly have ripe offerings to choose their next manager from. Pep Guardiola is walking into a manager’s dream at Bayern, Jurgen Klopp – a man of his word – has a contract for 3 more years at Dortmund and Guus Hiddink is set to retire from the game. That leaves only one reasonable option – No, Not David Moyes – but Malaga’s Chilean manager Manuel Pellegrini. Track Record Pellegrini has managed 13 teams in his 25-year managerial career starting with Universidad Chile – the club he played for throughout his playing days. It was not until he took charge of Universidad Catolica in 1994 that his managerial potential was noticed. Catolica finished Runners-Up in 94’ and 95’ seasons. He won his first National Championship with Ecuadorian club Liga de Quito in 1999 before leading San Lorenzo to their first International title – winning the Copa Sudamericana in 2002 (equivalent to the Europa League). After few fairly successful seasons in Argentina, including a brief stint at River Plate, he joined Villarreal in July 2004. In his first season at Villarreal, the Yellow Submarines qualified for the UEFA Champions League finishing 3rd in the La Liga and also reached the Quarter-finals of the UEFA Cup. Things would get better next season as Villarreal reached the Champions League Semi-Finals and lost narrowly to Arsenal with Juan Roman Riquelme missing a crucial penalty in the 2nd leg. Villarreal would finish 5th , 2nd and 5th in the next 3 seasons while also reaching the Champions League Quarter-Finals (losing to Arsenal again) Impressed by his work at Villarreal, Real Madrid hired Pellegrini at the start of the 2009-10 season but inspite of scoring 96 points in the league, Pellegrini was gone at the end of the season. The shock Copa del Rey loss to Alcorcon and another disappointing Champions League performance (Round of 16 exit) led to his dismissal but his record of 36 wins and 5 draws in 48 games with a 75% win percentage was actually good. By the end of 2010, he was working at Malaga who qualified for the Champions League the following season with a club-record 58 points. Despite the loss of key players Santi Cazorla and Salomon Rondon due to severe financial problems, Pellegrini stayed at Malaga and led them to a creditable Quarter-final run in the Champions League where they were controversially beaten by Borussia Dortmund in injury time. Tactical Preference At Villarreal, he played a 4-2-2-2 formation with 2 stopping midfielders in midfield and wing-backs pushing up to attack much like the way Chelsea play now. In the final third of the field, Villarreal deployed two strikers and in central midfield two interiores – attacking midfielders who are versatile. The two interiores are the creative hub of the team and Mata and Hazard strike me as perfect candidates for that spot. At Malaga, Pellegrini continued with the 4-2-2-2 with few tweaks but this season he reinvented Joaquin as a ‘Second-Striker’ to bring about a classic 4-2-3-1 look to his formation. More recently, due to Eliseu’s injury, Pellegrini used the diamond formation with Toulalan at the base and Isco at the tip with box-to-box wingers on either side. His tactical nuance is undoubted and he has installed firm footballing philosophies at both Villarreal and Malaga. His teams have a certain fluid ‘pass and move’ flavor to them but he has set up rigid formations in matches where he needs more defensive security. Conclusion His time at Real Madrid may be a little off-putting but it’s worth noting that he installed a footballing philosophy at both Villarreal and Malaga and has a good track record in the Champions League overall. Of course, Chelsea is a big step up from Malaga and Villarreal but he has had experience at the top level unlike most other managerial candidates.His professionalism is admired by his peers but on the contrary to his public image, he has made bold decisions; most notably dropping Juan Roman Riquelme at Villarreal and Raul at Real Madrid. He doesn’t have Premier League experience, but he is experienced enough now to adapt . He is not one of the ‘fancied’ candidates for the job but Manuel Pellegrini would currently be the best choice after Jose. He is the sort of manager who can build a team out of our talented crop of players stats and figures: whoscored.com and transfermarkt.com Click here to view the article

May 15. Day of the Europa League final

I wonder what will happen if Schurrle signs and de Bruyne stays. Problem of plenty is better than lack of depth i guess

Haha! Unbelievable. Is that really Alec Stewart? I know he's a Chelsea fan but this is weirdly coincidental. That is a famous banner in Chelsea history and can't believe that one of our celebrity fans is in that shot

Leverkusen should accept first

"Schürrle update. Chelsea have now submitted a second, improved offer (€22m + bonus) in case De Bruyne opts out. Ball in Leverkusen's court" That was Raphael Honigstein (@honigstein) on Twitter edit: He also added this - "it's "take it or leave it" - no more negotiations"

Not anymore. His groin gave away and he had 2 surgeries in November, came back and injured it again. He's been poor since his return. Half-hearted when tackling and almost never going for full-throttle challenges. Pardew took him off even before the hour mark in the derby where his distribution was also surprisingly average.

Far from being under-rated, Mikel is the most overrated player in our squad. I don't think a decent midfield pivot will be over-run so many times in a season. In the first half, Mikel made two poor passes resulting in continous City pressure. I wish I had a GIF of that because when I was watching I went like - "WTF? Mikel. Hold the fuckin ball". He Then went walkabout for the goal. No denying he has done well at times but he's no Makalele or Essien and we should be having a much better pivot than our current options

It's time to move on now. Fulham away on Wednesday

We gain nothing from a ban on Aguero but if he isn't banned, then he's available for City vs Spurs. Top 4 more important. Don't ban Aguero

What a coincidence that he has a bad game as soon as the waiter daftly decided to stick him on the right wing...

Reporter: What did you think of the Aguero challenge on Luiz? Mancini: 'I didn't see it'. It was right in front of you. Mancini: 'I need glasses' Wanker.