TorontoChelsea

Our passing is awful so far...

He hasn't had much of a shot but I think the fact that both Bertrand and Benayoun were played even out of position ahead of him by different managers tells me that he must look really bad in training,

See my post a couple of pages back. He has to not suck. Marin has 1 tackle in five appearances. He is useless defensively, holds on to the ball too long in attack which slows us down, and gives the ball away carelessly. The fact that this is the second manager not to trust Marin at all and to play mediocre players ahead of him (Benayoun, Bertrand) makes it pretty obvious that he's not good enough for Chelsea right now.

If one manager doesn't like a player, it could be the manager or the system, but the fact that neither RDM or Benitez have any interest in playing Marin does tell me something. RDM preferred Bertrand to Marin and we all know how weak Bertrand is on the wing yet I can understand why he did it. Benitez prefers Benayoun who is hardly a superstar but I can still see why. Benayoun and Marin have similar game-time this year and while neither have contributed much offensively (1 goal versus 1 assist) there has been a big difference defensively. Marin has 1 tackle, 2 interceptions, and 1 clearance. Benayoun has 10 tackles, 6 interceptions, and 8 clearances. Managers don't like players who can't contribute on the defensive end. It's one thing, if you're Mata and you're an offensive superstar, it's another for someone like Marin. I'd be very surprised if he's back at Chelsea next year.

I just use firstrow or oleoletv.com and eventually I always find something watchable. Luckily, this one's on TV for me.

I'm OK with this...Cole, Mata, Azpilicueta, Ramires, Moses and Ba all get a rest which is significant.

I remain doubtful they'd sell, but yeah, he'd be a great addition to any club. He's been one of the best strikers in the world over the last decade and likely still has a good 3 or 4 years left at a top level. 11 goals, 9 assists, strong in the air, great at holding up the ball, can slot into a team in a few different places. He's nobody's favourite person, but he's a top player.

Sorry to hear that. As Hutcho says, it does put things in perspective. Spring is coming and hopefully along with it, a better 2013 for you.

Why is he not ready? Because he hasn't played against top competition. You're saying all these wonderful things about him, but it's all based on playing in competition that is vastly inferior to the competition Chelsea face. Nobody is denying he's been a very good player in the Championship but that's a far cry from being good enough for Chelsea. The Championship is the equivalent of a poor European league. It has no top players, no top teams. How many players come from the Championship and then are good enough to help a top team in the Premier League the next season? It's very rare. Yes Bale went straight to Spurs...to an 11th place side...and the next year an 8th place side. If developing young talent is more important than winning, then by all means, let's recall everyone and try to develop them but that's not even being Arsenal, that's being Southampton . To compete at the level Chelsea want to, Chelsea need to have a team of players who can play at the top level. You don't win competitions because you have people that can probably handle playing against the poorer sides. ManU isn't going to win because of Nick Powell. They're going to win because of Van Persie and Rooney and Carrick and Evra, etc... You are creating a ridiculous false dichotomy which is that either Chelsea brings players straight from the Championship and gives them game time or our youth system is not worth pursuing. It's nonsense. The loan system is about getting players ready to play at Chelsea. Lukaku is succeeding in the Premier League, KDB iin the Bundesliga, and Courtois is excelling in La Liga. Those players are all ready to contribute to Chelsea if needed because they've shown the ability to compete at a top level. That is what is required in order to get into a Chelsea side and that's the way it should be. Chalobah is not yet at that level and he's young so I don't see the need to rush him either. It will be better for Chalobah's development to play regularly for a Premier League club. I'd rather he gets 35 games with a promoted Watford (or similar) including matchups against top clubs than to play 15 games with us all against poorer sides. We've been through this before with Kakuta and McEachran. Phenoms who were guaranteed to be good enough for Chelsea and neither were and their development stagnated. Anyway, it's a moot point because I very much doubt if Chalobah is at Chelsea next season.

Attention to detail and communication are two very different things. This is a direct quote from Alex "This situation was being talked about for a while, and in part that was because of Andre's behaviour. He is not the kind of person who talks a lot - he's a bit closed. That's just the way he is." We saw even this year how upset Lloris was at AVB because he didn't communicate with him. AVB had lost the dressing room, not just Lampard. Managers are much much more replaceable than players. In our last 16 games under AVB, we won 4 games. We were drawing to teams like Wigan, Birmingham, and Norwich and losing to sides like Villa and WBA. We were blown out in Napoli where AVB used a bizarre starting XI which backfired completely. AVB left Chelsea with no choice but to fire him. We were awful! Would you have preferred that Chelsea got rid of Lampard and Cole just to keep a manager? Say goodbye to our CL win and we'd likely be even worse off now. Players like managers they can respect, they don't like managers who alienate half the players. In order to get respect, you have to earn it and AVB didn't earn it. Yes, Rafa did inherit a team not playing well and he's still done poorly relative to that. There was no new manager bounce, and we haven't played well for any stretch of games. It doesn't matter because he's gone anyway. As for Chalobah, no he's not ready. I think he is more likely to have a long-term impact than than any other Chelsea loaned player not playing in a top league right now. However, the difference in class between the Championship and the Premier League is big but the difference between the Championship and the top of the Premier League is enormous. The best player in the Championship (which is not Chalobah) would not be good enough to play regularly at Chelsea. I agree with @the only place to be and others that we need to bring in youth players, but next year, that'll be KDB and Lukaku who are both doing well at a high level and even then, I don't see either of them being a starter right away. Chalobah needs to go back on loan to a better side. Ideally, Watford will be promoted and he'd go there, but any Premier League side where he gets regular time will do.

You can't win with kids anymore. That quote was from 1995 and in that time, you could win with youth. Most teams brought up their own players. Transfers were tiny and cheap. The league was still largely British. You can't compete with top class players by bringing through kids as regular starters anymore. Other clubs are buying top players every year. There is a massive gap between potential and actual performance. @JDY I have no idea how you can read what happened last season like that. It was up to AVB to take control of the team and he couldn't handle basic communication. Not just with Lampard or Cole but with Alex and Anelka and others. He couldn't get his message across and he didn't seem to even try. He was at fault for that. Lampard was benched under RDM earlier this year and we heard nothing. Why? RDM communicated with Lampard and unlike under AVB, we actually played well. AVB played a style that didn't suite the club and we played some awful football. Saying that the situation was ruined because of senior players is simply ridiculous.

Ugh...there's no point really, but what the hell. Nobody, and I mean, nobody with any knowledge of football thinks David Luiz at this point in time is a world class defensive midfielder. Luiz has played about 5 games at the position Even if they were five fantastic games, that's not enough games to be considered a top class player. Javi Martinez has nothing to do with this discussion. He's a very good defensive midfielder for years in La Liga so he is not unproven at all. HMartinez' price tag and Luiz's quality as a defensive midfielder are not even remotely related in any way. It's like your comparing a a rhinoceros to a bag of twizzlers and saying "see!!!" No, I don't see.

So I take it you're not going to build a career around refereeing/fleeing Lebanese football matches.

And reputation. It wasn't a dive, it was an embellishment. Drogba definitely was fouled, but he went down like he was shot. (The key is often that the knees are up when players dive/embellish to make it look more dramatic. When you get hit or tripped and are falling, you just put your hands down to protect yourself or try to cushion your fall in some other way. Anything else is just completely unnatural.) I'd actually like to see more double yellows. That is a foul where the player being fouled also exaggerates. Referees seem to think it has to be one or the other but often it's both.

It's not a red. If a Chelsea player got a red like that, we'd rightly be livid, especially in a match of this magnitude. Nani went to try to knock the ball down with his foot and didn't see the player. Yes, a red was justifiable by the laws of the game, but refs never abide purely by the laws of the game. It reminds me of the Canada/US women's football match in the Olympics where the US was awarded a free kick inside the penalty box because the Canadian keeper held on to the ball for more than 6 seconds. US scored and won the game because of that. Technically, it is justifiable to make calls like that, but it's also terrible refereeing. ManU was up 1-0, a close, exciting game, you don't give a red unless it is impossible not to. The same way you don't give a penalty unless you're sure because it will change the game entirely. Had Nani got a yellow, nobody would have thought twice about it. Every game, there are some calls that can go either way. The referee should not impose himself on the game unless necessary.

To be fair, it's a tough call. Some people want to be alone when they're depressed. Some people do act like dicks to drive other people away when they're depressed. The key is to have close friends who know you. Acquaintances come and go, but it's the people who truly care about you, who matter and they're the ones who will help you out of your funk. About HIV, you're right. It's actually quite difficult to catch and its spread is a testament to just how much sex people have. I read this article a while back and I think it really got me thinking. http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2012/feb/01/top-five-regrets-of-the-dying Happiness is, to some degree a choice (taking out massive chemical imbalances) It's harder for some of us than others of course, but we've all met people who by all rights should be so happy and are miserable and people who should be miserable and are happy no matter what. If you've ever seen the movie Happy Go Lucky, I think it's a brilliant take on someone who chooses happiness.

Tough vote this month. I generally really like the posts of Peace and the only place to be but voted for Skipper.

Every time I see her interviewed, she comes off as so likable. It's why it's so easy to have a crush on her...she's smoking hot, smart, and down to earth. She even likes playing videogames and going to sporting events. Damn!

I think a lot of us have had depression. They key is finding the thing that get you out of it. For me, when I used to get depressed, it'd lead into this cycle of not being social and isolating myself which would then get me more depressed. Now, if I feel down, I make sure to meet up with close friends and just go out for a night and not think. Works very well for me but everyone has their own keys. (sometimes, one does need medication)

I should have clarified...not in a game against the other one.

When's the last time Barca or Madrid got screwed out of Europe by a ref? Seems to happen all the time to English teams.

I'd smile, but I actually think it's against English teams in general which screws us as well. English teams always seem to get screwed by refs in Europe.

That's some quality diving right there.

The worst thing is that it ruined the game. It was a fantastic, tense game and the ref with one stupid call, just fucked it.

Wow, what a goal.