TorontoChelsea

Ivanovic!

Great goal by Moses.

There we go...

Crap.

Gus Poyet knocks Newcastle out of the FA Cup yet again! (He scored a brace for us against Newcastle in the FA Cup semi-finals in 2000). Always liked him as a player. Scored some fantastic goals for us so nice to see him have some success with Brighton.

Just watched Brighton's Lopez with one of the worst dives I've seen in order to get Ameobi sent off (which worked). He literally rolled over five times. The last one, he actually stopped to make sure the ref was watching and then went on to roll again. Should be a suspension IMO.

It Cole leaves, we'll buy another LB for sure. CB is one position where we have depth IMO. Terry, Luiz, Ivanovic, and Cahill.

I think Ba should be starting probably today and then against Stoke for sure. He has the physical play that is quite useful against those thugs. Torres would just get pushed out wide.

Lampard should get a breather for this game. Would like to see Oscar in the pivot instead today. We should be rotating the squad these next two Cup games give players a bit of a rest for the league, but not all at once!!

I think formations tend to be too much of a fad (there's always an "in" formation) and managers should use the one that is best for your squad rather than trying to copy one that fits another team. That said, The 4-3-3 would solve problems for some players (it would also be better for Ramires IMO) but would be worse for Hazard and Mata who are our two best offensive players which is why I don't see it happening. I don't know if anyone really plays with a narrow 4-3-3 these days because it leaves your wings so exposed. You clog the centre of the pitch, but your width has to come from your fullbacks with really no cover. If a cross by a fullback isn't successful or if they give away possession, the opposition winger can run, unmolested, the length of the pitch. Offensively, there are problems as well because it would (once again) mean that Hazard, Mata, and Oscar would be playing in very much the same area of the pitch.

We definitely need a deep-lying midfielder and Benat seems like he'd be a good choice. My real concern though is then what happens with Oscar? I understand the Oscar transfer only if Chelsea were going to make him into their deep-lying midfielder and there was indication from Oscar that this was indeed going to be the case. He's going to have a difficult time getting regular starts up front with Hazard and Mata ahead of him so my preference would be to start giving Oscar more games in the pivot to see what he can do there and if he doesn't work, we can get a replacement in the summer. (It's not like it's Benat or nobody. There are a number of central midfielders who will be available.)

The friends of that West Ham fan can laugh at him forever because of this. Any single time he opens his mouth to try to express an opinion on anything to do with football, they can just say, "Scott Canham is better than Frank Lampard" and he has to shut up.

Agree. He's a good pickup for what I assume is pretty cheap. He's probably ready to play immediately (he looked great against Arsenal) and his father is English so the adjustment should be easy. I wonder if having Steffan Freund as assistant coach at Spurs helped this along. And for the record, I think Spurs have had a fantastic season in the transfer window. They've completely rebuilt their squad, made it younger and better, and did it an no cost. Of course, Arsenal have won the transfer market value league many times and it's translated into no trophies for years.

I think it is. I think it's about Roman wanting a locker room with no strong, veteran presence so the manager can have complete control. Roman wants a new start and a new Chelsea.

I honestly don't think it matters what Frank decides. I think this just about Roman wanting a change. I don't think Cole will be back either for the same reason.

Clearly not like Torres...Millhouse's first touch is quality.

Replaces Drogba who crossed himself after goals. One day we'll get an atheist striker who will do science experiments after he scores.

It could be even better: Blues Bag Ba, Ban Blondie to Bench. Benitez Booted by Board who buy Busquets and Bale for Bupkis.

Agreed. People want to read too much into individual games. I'm not saying Oscar will be great in the pivot, he might not work out, but it's worth a shot. Not sure Oscar, Mata, and Hazard (how the hell did Mazacar or whatever become a nickname when "Omaha" fits?) will ever be able to play together well up front. Even Barcelona need one of their front-3 to provide width. It's just too imbalanced for my liking.

We're a deeply emotional board...We just need to control our mood swings better....Too much of this from game to game-

Everyone on the team should have more assists and would if we had better finishing! I agree with some of what you say and some of it can be applied to Hazard as well. At Chelsea, Mata is the #10 and he gets the freedom to roam around the pitch. He deserves that right based on his play. However, this is really also the role that Hazard and Oscar would be best at and the role they're most used to (being the creator/finisher all over the pitch). RDM tried (perhaps at the request of Roman) to play the three of them up front but it didn't work because there was no defensive organization and no width in the attack. I'd like to see more of Oscar in the pivot because I think that's really the only place where he'll maybe be able to get a little bit of freedom and a chance to play.

I'm pretty sure he is just like I am pretty sure he's willing to play a little less. This is not about Lampard's demands as much as it's about Roman wanting a clean break. (If it were about his wage demands, they'd be negotiating right now. They're not.)

A lot of this is down to UEFA's, shall we say, tepid response to racism. It's clearly a problem and they ignore it and hope it goes away. http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2012/jun/18/uefa-2012-bendtner-fine-racism

I would take Grant over Rafa. He's a useless fat guy in a suite, but he's not a useless fat guy in a suite who Liverpool supporters drool over. I think we should actually just hire an actor to pretend to be manager for the rest of the year. Some suggestions... David Attenborough-He'd be useless, but at the press conferences, he could explain the grazing patterns of our striker so we'd understand why he wandered off to the wings and stood there. "the Torres is frightened by the ball so its natural inclination is to run away from it" and so on... Sacha Baron Cohen- He could create a character...maybe like a fat Spanish waiter or something. Mila Kunis/Kate Upton...etc...-Do I really have to explain this one? So many possibilities...

I'd agree with you maybe if it were just Lampard, but a lot of players had problems with AVB. Alex and Anelka were banished from practicing with the first team. Cole was upset. I'm sure other players were also not happy. Porto is different because it's a much smaller club where managers can come in and do sort of what they want. The single most important thing about managing top clubs is managing players. That is, communicating properly, explaining things, massaging egos, etc...AVB didn't think he had to do that. He's a smart guy. I think he learned his lesson.