Strike

Cech Ivanovic Luiz Cahill Cole Mikel Oscar Hazard Mata Marin Sturridge i want to see this team play against Stoke - provided Danny's injury was just a knock and that Marin is fit

too casual imo. casual passing throughout the night. have to snap out of this slump ASAP

well it is. the shortest game you can have takes over 3 hours. plus the overdose of cricket in this country has led to increased popularity for football.

the big clubs are heavily covered here in India and thus there has been an exponential increase in the number of Chelsea fans here. that and the general realisation that cricket is such a boring sport

can't turn this into a slump. need to get a move on in the league now. up the ante and pull clear of arsenal and manchester city

first half second half sums up the game, really

don't see the point of dumping it long to torres. the defenders ipass the ball back to cech whenever they are closed down and cech dumps it long for the opposition to gather the ball. plus, it doesn't help when luiz is also dumping the ball long every now and then. better to pass it along the ground and create space/openings

^agree. ramires' passing and decision-making have been shockingly bad

nah. robbie will be too concerned about juve swamping the midfield but expect mata in for bertrand to add that bit of spark we missed at loftus road

Hazard and Mata behind Torres. that's where Juve will get pumped

@KonohasOrangeFlash, kof calm down! but i agree. it's our game to lose

^aye. Frank Lampard. driving force in midfield. way too many goals for a midfield player. catalyst for chelsea's domination in the past decade

i get you. but we are better off this time around. Hazard is a class player we have added to the squad and adds that bit of dynamism needed against the bigger sides. under avb we didn't have that spark or live-wire who would help us get forward against a top side. now we have quite a few of them in hazard, oscar, marin, sturridge etc and if we get the balance of the team sorted, we will be bettter the worry is that it is mid-september and we are still experimenting

cech ivanovic cahill terry cole mikel lampard ramires mata hazard torres . mata switching with hazard . not particularly a fan of ramires on the wings but juve's wing-backs are double edged swords. while we should try and expose them, they could easily double team ivanovic and rape us. ramires, the machine can keep running up and down the right flank all day

we win this and the group looks much easier to tackle

good read. his point about the midfield will be something to watch out for. good chance of us losing the midfield battle. should tighten up the middle

the right players have been signed. the footballing philosophy has been radically different. give him time, he'll come good. i love how everyone on here were like "di Matteo has got some balls " after the Reading game and then "di Matteo should grow some balls" after the QPR game. di matteo will learn from this. remember the falcao horror show? di matteo must have been concerned about the defence and thus went with 2 defensive wingers supplementing hazard. we were defensively solid although it was compromised in attack. plus we did not have Juan Mata. the proverbial glue that holds the team together instead we had Lampard in the creative mid position who had a poor game. this lead to a lot of astray passes and inevitably we came under pressure. too early to judge di matteo

good choices for mods not sure about spike though

agree with the player power. disagree with the sacking part. calm down before judging rdm. sure he needs to be more ballsy but give him time. atleast the defense has bn sorted

the overreaction is more about the fact that we decided to "man the barricades" than try and control the play against qpr. maybe the falcao horror show was still in rdm's mind but he didn't change much in the second half to help the team attack more. against reading Oscar and sturridge came on nice and early to have an impact. tbf our defensive shape was much better but i wonder whether we can get the perfect balance between a solid defence and a devastating attack. Mata is the key imo

with hazard continuously drifting tothe left, our creative midfielder was lampard and as max mentioned lampard had a pass% of 69%. says it all really. our only source of attacks were cech's goalkicks

all we did actually was pump balls through cech. embarassing really. a crude wake-up call to all those who expect a title challenge this season on the plus side the defence was good, compact. mikel was a beast in the middle although he didnt have much help in the midfield battle lampard was dreadful tbf. sloppy passing, easily turned and outmuscled

whenever xpetrcechx posts it

the tempo will be up and the tackles will be flying in. not really sure of us getting a comfortable win today.

selling both of them is a risk because we need good(ish) squad players. Meireles did a good job against Newcastle and we could have used him in the CL or like last year as a 3rd choice. agree withthe romeu and oscar getting a chance part but it is as Spike put it, the squad looks a tad hollow now