TorontoChelsea

Well, and then off goes Wilshire.

Chin up. Arsenal did come back against Reading!

That's it.

Why did Walcott take the free kick? They have Arteta and Cazorla. And what a horrible free kick it was.

One thing you can usually say about Arsenal is that they play attractive football...ok, two things. They play attractive football and don't win anything. Looks like only one of those things is happening this year.

That is fitting for this game. It's like a bunch of lazy people playing at the park. Just sloppy from everyone.

This game is terrible right now. I think it's the lunch-time game syndrome. Someone should do a study, but I think the quality of play in the early games is often worse.

You never know. Ferguson might sub on Buttner and Wooten.

Knock on wood, but when I look at a game like this I get really thankful of how healthy we've managed to stay. Arsenal has no Rosicky, Gervinho, Diaby, Gibbs, Oxlade-Chamberlin, Szczesny, or Fabiansky. Makes me understand why they're playing like such crap (well, to some degree).

Santos is a pylon. Just awful. I understand going in defensively against ManU, but this ManU team is vulnerable defensively. You need to attack them.

Hard to say about Wilshire. He played a full season at a top level at 19 and that's impressive but he didn't jump out and he's had a serious injury. I guess we'll see in a couple of years. Not sure why Arsenal keep playing Ramsey on the right over Walcott. They have no width and Walcott could cause Evra real problems. Also, I still can't believe Santos plays as much as he does. He's truly awful.

I'm not trying to take it away from him. He scored a massive goal and a fantastic one at that but we won because of a team effort, not simply because of that goal.

Do you believe we would have gotten to Munich without Ramires or without Cole or Lampard or Cech or Bosingwa? Of course Drogba was key. He scored goals against Napoli and Barcelona and defended brilliantly but you're last line is exactly the problem I have with this line of thinking. The "him" could be a dozen players.

Yeah "overscore" is even better. This, to me, is overscoring. Not a bad thing at all.

None. No one player wins a cup. It's a team game. Look at the CL. Drogba's goal got us into penalties. But we don't get to penalties without Cech standing on his head, without Cole, Mikel, and everyone putting in a fantastic defensive effort. (and without some luck). We don't even get to Munich without Ramires scoring, without Lampard setting him up beautifully and with a heroic defensive effort by everyone. We don't get past Benfica without Kalou and Meireles scoring. We don't get past Napoli without Ivanovic's goal and without a total team dominance in the home leg. That's the way football works. It's a team game. Drogba scored some immense goals for us, he is definitely one of our best players ever, but he also had some bad periods. He was viewed as a disappointment when he first came. He was missing lots of chances and diving all the time. In the league, he scored 8 or fewer goals three times in 8 years. He got sent off for a stupid red in Moscow that could very well have cost us the Champions' League. Again, Drogba is a Chelsea legend, but if you look at the numbers (yes, stats!) there's simply no way you can justify picking him as #1. And as for the other stuff, you don't think Lampard created goals for his teammates? You don't think Zola created space? You don't think someone like Terry has brought intangible values to the team? And it's not just the statistics. It's how people thought of him. Drogba was Chelsea's best player once in his entire career. Four different Chelsea players in the past 20 years have won it multiple times including two players that were contemporaries of Drogba.. I don't even see what the argument for Drogba is for #1 overall.

I think it says a lot about our team, that I'm excited about watching every game. Even when we're not on a particularly good streak, we are great to watch and have the ability to beat anyone. What more could you ask for?

He was great, but didn't play enough games for us to be considered a top all-time player IMO. (4.5 seasons). Also, here's why, to me, Lampard beats Drogba hands-down. It's difficult to compare people from different eras, but Lampard and Drogba played the same time. Games-Lampard 572, Drogba-341 Goals-Lampard 189, Drogba-157 Assists-Lampard-120, Drogba-71 Chelsea player of year, Lampard-3, Drogba-1 PFA team of the year, Lampard 3-, Drogba-2 Just don't see how Drogba beats Lampard when Lampard was better and better for significantly longer for us.

Yeah, don't think he will be which is sad because I think he could be a fantastic impact sub for a few years. (And because it would piss off idiots like the poster above you who are obsessed with buying new players and have no respect for legends.)

I think in a few years, Drogba might not even be considered top-5. He had two fantastic years at Chelsea and was named Chelsea Player of the Year only once. Some of this is that Roman kept trying to bring in new strikers to displace Drogba so his games went up and down, but in Drogba's 8 years at Chelsea, he had a number of poor seasons. Drogba is undoubtedly a Chelsea legend and one of our greats, but I think his incredible form in the CL last year meant he left on a high that is still influencing people.

Love Drogba obviously, but he's not even in the discussion for best ever. Lampard, Zola, or Osgood are the three legit candidates for the title IMO.

Jose Bosingwa and Kalou are also a CL winner for us and they got no respect. Luiz was playing well but recently has hit a relly bad patch. And no, great centre backs don't make the mistakes Luiz makes. Every defender will sometimes be late to get to their man, sometimes they won't communicate properly and let someone get by them, sometimes they aren't positioned properly. They don't launch 3 useless passes upfield every game. They don't wander into midfield attacking and cough up the ball. That's what's so frustrating. The mistakes are childish and pointless. Chelsea should be trying to build from the back. Luiz's long attacking passes are terrible and yet, he doesn't stop. Chelsea play a very attacking squad, we don't need our centre back to rush up with the ball. He does all the time and yesterday is just the first time it burned us. His job is to defend and when he concentrates on that, he's very good at it but he doesn't seem to be able to mature as a player. It's not like an issue of confidence which is tricky or an issue of positional awareness which takes time. These are simple mistakes that he just keeps making. I'm not saying we should see him or anything so rash (although if there really was an offer for 30M pounds, I would have snapped it up in a second) just that I think he needs a talking to (which I can't believe he hasn't got before so maybe he just needs to listen) and maybe a seat on the bench for a couple of games once Terry comes back.

No! Chelsea should just institute a new policy starting in January. Any player who misses an easy chance or makes an error that leads to a goal, immediately gets sold.. This will, to use Republican parlance, "incentivize" the workers. Mata missed a gaping net? Sell him! Cech let in a bad goal? He's useless, sell him! The replacements to these players will be bought based on who currently has the coolest youtube compilation of skills.

] At some point, all players need to rest. We're going to play 60+ games this season. Last season, Mata started 48 games and was exhausted by the end of the year. If you're not going to sit players for this match, what matches are you going to sit them in? Also, if Oscar and Hazard start, Moses doesn't get a chance to earn more playing time. It was the right starting lineup from RDM. I think next round he'll go even more to the bench. Beating United was important.

It's true, in the current system having two central midfielders makes some sense. However, I think we need to move long-term to add a winger to the front three. I can see Moses being that guy. Right now, we are too predictable in our attack and it is only through the incredible skill of Mata, Oscar, and Hazard that the system is able to work. Long term, against top teams, we'll need to be better tactically. My preference would be to move Oscar back into the double pivot. I understand why some would be reluctant to do that because it would take away some of Oscar's game, but I also think it takes advantage of him and is great for the team. There is such an unbelievable dearth of regista-type players in football today. Who's the best one in the Premier league? Arteta? Scholes? How many top ones are there in world football? Pirlo, Xavi, Alonso,and then?? It's a very tough spot to fill. To be able to take a guy and say "here is our midfield general for the next decade" would be incredible and provide long-term stability to the team. BTW, your post is what I like about the forum. People who I disagree with, who provide alternate viewpoints intelligently and without hatred seething from every line. Informed debate is just the best.

What I would do as well. Terry is back after this game, so rest for the defenders will be easy to get going forward. Goalies just don't get the same workout so not worried about his energy.