TorontoChelsea

This is the absurdity of judging a player on a handful of games. He looked really good all tournament had a solid first half and then in the second half, he was just awful,.I obviously haven't seen him enough to judge, but he might make decent cover for Ivanovic. Chelsea are not going to spend 20M pounds on cover at RB. Anyone they get will be an incomplete and flawed player.

4 times? That's only once every 43.75 pages of the Hulk transfer discussions! It should be pinned on top of every page instead of the constant "news" from "www.stuffimadeupabouthulk.com". or wherever else.

Because Spain have ridiculous depth at midfield.I love Mata, but the last two matches, Spain have started with Xavi, Inesta, and Silva in the midfield with Fabergas and Navas off the bench. That's insane depth at midfield. Even making the squad at that position is a sign that you are a special player.

He seems like he's a bit of a dick, but lots of players are and it also doesn't mean they can't mature. Look at someone like Anelka who kept making a nuisance of himself everywhere he went.He was sold 8 times in 11 years. Even when he came to Chelsea, when he missed the penalty in the CL final, he classlessly blamed Grant somehow. Then, at the World Cup, he attacked the coach and led a mutiny and was subsequently banned from the National Team. In Shanghai, Anelka complained about Tigana's coaching method and was instrumental in driving him out. Now, he's complaining publicly that they hired Batista to coach. In other words, Anelka is hardly a mature, likeable human being, but he still had a very good Chelsea career.

I think it's pretty normal as players get older and have families, to want to go "home". It's not something I'd worry about with Mata though. For one, you have a player now and for the foreseeable future. Why fret over what may be?. Also, I believe his sister lives in England so he has a tie there (and he might just prefer living in London). Thirdly, Spanish football is serious long-term trouble. La Liga teams are in something like 3B pounds of debt.with six teams in bankruptcy. With the current economic troubles in Europe, especially in Spain, who knows what the future holds.

If he wants to play for Spain, then it's up to him. The Olympics will be a maximum of 6 matches and probably fewer (Even if Spain win it all, they might rest players if they clinch the division and of course, they might not go to the finals.) Looking at the schedule, the only way this becomes an issue is if Spain go to the semi-finals in which case, Mata would only have a week or so to rest for Chelsea's first game. Worst-case scenario, Spain wins it all and Chelsea sit him for one game against Wigan and Mata gets a 13 day rest.

I believe we should use youngsters more as well, but this is way way too much. We need to work guys who are ready into positions where they are depth and get into 15-20 games. I'd be OK with McEachran being the 6th or 7th midfielder (would rather he went on loan though) because even if something were to happen with injuries, McEachran would still not need to be a starter. It's comfortable depth. But Todd Kane? He hasn't played a single professional game in his life. He needs to go on loan for at least 2-3 years and play well regularly before he should even be considered to be a backup for Chelsea. I don't think we need an elite RB, Ivanovic should be our starter, but we need someone who is capable of stepping in and playing at a high level immediately.

You're not listening to anything I'm saying. Of course, I'd rather have Hazard and Hulk over Podolski and Giroud. but it's about value. I'd rather have Torres than Chamakh, but Torres was 50M and Chamak was free. Hulk and Hazard would be about 70M and Podolski and Giroud would be about 23M.You can't just discard the transfer fee. And Chelsea are not being run well. We had the second highest debt in the Premier League last season. Chelsea's in the transfer market in the last 2 years has maybe been the worst any club has been in transfer history. We spent about 117M pounds on 5 players and only one is an elite player and seems like a definite starter for Chelsea for the next few years (Mata). For that kind of expenditure, Chelsea should have been able to buy 3 or 4 excellent players. As for only RVP making our starting XI, that's just nonsense. Arsenal finished above us in the league and beat us head to head. They have a lot of talent. Song is a fantastic defensive midfielder and he is actually very creative as well. He would certainly start for us. So would Walcott (who gets a lot of stick from fans who don't see Arsenal play much. He might be the fastest player in the Premiership, and he creates a tremendous number of chances..8 goals and 11 assists in the Premier league last season.) A few other players would have a regular rotation spot and would challenge for playing time (Wilshire, Vermaelan, Oxlade-Chamberlain, and others). Even if we were infinitely better than Arsenal talent-wise, why would that be a source of pride? Our starting XI cost about 4 times more than theirs. It damn well should be better. I know I am in the minority among Chelsea fans, but I want to see reigning in of spending. What has happened in the last decade in football-led by Chelsea, Man City, and the Spanish clubs, has been an absolute disaster for football. It really does need to be addressed.

For me, it's less about faith in youth than it is about consistently good signings. This is one of the big benefits of having a long-term manager who has influence over signings. They sign players they believe will fit into the system. This is why Chelsea need that long-term manager who can start to do that. You get better value on your buys and you can avoid huge mistakes.

Of course. That was obviously tremendous, but I also care about building a sustainable model. If Chelsea went through that same route again 100 times, they'd probably would only win the CL a handful of times. I think the ideal set-up is like Arsenal except being able to spend 20-30M on an individual player if they really fit a need.

Still a great buy for the price of £11M. He's not a star, but he could be a good player for Arsenal (and I think he'll fit into their system well). Obviously not an Arsenal supporter, but you can't help but admire the way they do their transfers. You look at their starting XI from last season and they were almost all ridiculous value (RVP- £2.75, Song £1M, Walcott £5-12M depending on performance, etc....) Even someone like Gervinho who was a bust last season cost millions less than Lukaku did for us. It's just so simple. They look around for players who are good value and make an offer for them if what the club wants is more than they value the player, they move on to someone else. It shows that you don't have to splash massive amounts of cash around to compete. I suppose we looked for value with Marin, but generally our transfer policy is backwards. It's just identifying the player RA is obsessed with regardless of how they'll fit into the team and then just spending how ever much it takes to get them. It's not about being cheap, it's about value.

Maybe he can just tell them that supporting Chelsea has miraculous health benefits! . You're child isn't growing fast enough? Here's a Peter Cech doll. You're impotent? Well, a John Terry shirt will clear that right up , etc...

Money, opportunity, distance...Australia has something like 22 million people. California alone has about 37 million.

I don't understand how anybody could blame Frank for anything here. It was fairly obvious that AVB had a big problem communicating with the players. It wasn't just Frank, it was Alex, Anelka, Cole, Mikel, Kalou, and probably others. It wasn't about AVB sitting Lampard, RDM sat Lampard a fair bit, it's about communicating with your players. I also think beyond the sitting players without explaining why, players were unsure of what their exact roles were. If you are going to come in and massively overhaul a system, you need to be to explain player roles very clearly.

My guess is Ronaldo. They basically just go back and forth with those two. In 2010, it should have been Iniesta or Xavi who were not only excellent for Barcelona, but helped Spain win the World Cup.

Strurridge looks certain to go and is actually our player I'm most interested in seeing as he's likely to play central striker. It will only be a handful of games, so it will be hard to judge either way, but will still be interesting to see.

Agreed. Torres has become a ridiculous distraction. Every single game devolves into an obsessive rehashing of every Torres move. He didn't score, but he made a nice run in the 73rd minute and had Chelsea played a perfect cross in the 32nd minute, he would have scored, and that shows that he's almost in form and so on. The media also knows that Torres as a flop is a popular story so they mention the "50 million pound striker" and his poor form almost every time he touches the ball.

Balotelli is a phenomenal talent. He reminds me a little of Sturridge in that they are both immensely talented and produce, but are inconstant, selfish, and incredibly young and face a disproportionate amount of fan loathing . I would take Mario in a second. You often gain maturity as you age, you can't learn talent. The guy has scored 19 goals in 40 Premier league games and isn't yet 22. It's not going to happen of course, but so it's all theoretical.

What? You mean that the rumours of Exeter City swooping in with a 50M pound offer for Hulk aren't true either?

Alba makes a lot of sense and Modric make some sense for Barcelona but Hulk doesn't at all. Barcelona has more depth at RW than any other team in the world.They just bought Alexis as a RW last season and Cuenca is his 21 year old back up there. Pedro, Messi, and Villa can also all play RW if needed as well.

Exactly...I never get that attitude. Why are being a Chelsea supporter and being able to recognize and appreciate talent on other teams mutually exclusive? Bale is a terrific player. It doesn't you me a Spurs fan to realize that.

Wiki has Ramires with 6 assists and Soccernet with 5 in 44 matches in all competitions (and 1 or 2 in the league). Either way, I don't think it matters. Ramires simply isn't a creative force. He's good at opening space for other players and making key runs, but he doesn't have the skill-set to replace Lampard. We don't need a Lampard replacement this season, but when we do, it will have to be someone who can open up the other team. It's not just the direct assists that Lampard contributes, it's the probing balls that open up the other team's defence. You need that creativity from midfield, otherwise the offence becomes too stagnant.

Toure is excellent at moving the ball and Milner is fine and Mikel is nothing like Alonso. Mikel is good at making short, accurate passes in tight space but he's not a creative midfielder in the least. His ball movement is actually a little slow and he rarely passes the ball more than few yards. That's fine. He's in the lineup for his defensive skills and intelligence. In the last two years, in 109 league games, Ramires and Mikel combined for 2 assists. They simply are not good enough to create chances with any sort of regularity.. Toure and Milner combined for 11 assists last year alone.

I think Mikel and Ramires together regularly would be a disaster. You need to have good ball movement and creativity from the deep lying midfielders and neither Ramires or Mikel is remotely capable of playing that role. You need someone who can get the ball from the defense to the attackers and who can spring the counter-attack with intelligence. Can you see Ramires or Mikel playing a long ball to Hazard as he streak down the wing? Can you see them playing a 30 yard beautiful through-ball to Mata coming through the middle? Not a chance. So, what you'd have instead is Mata coming back deep to get the ball which would in effect turn the 4-2-3-1 into a 4-3-2-1.I think Lampard backed by Meireles makes the most sense if Chelsea play that system.

Meh...I'm always hesitant to judge a human being based on personal anecdotes. One person doesn't like another and all of a sudden it's "so and so is a cunt". Maybe he just hated signing autographs? Maybe he didn't want to stand around talking to kids half his age. You have to remember their ages. In say, 2003, Tillen was 18 and Desailly was 35. Terry was 23. Of course Terry is going to be talking to the youth players more, they were his contemporaries. Desailly was a grown man who probably wanted to just get home to his wife and kids. To me, Desailly was a great Chelsea defender and all this other stuff seems petty and insignificant.