Corner

I'm sure a Wigan fan would tell you that 'eccentricity' is under-rated in a goalkeeper. But to be fair, some of the saves he pulls off often cancel out his dodgy moments as a keeper.

Agreed. In other words: Plan B, Plan C, Plan D and so on...

United and City are both going to drop points today. You heard me.

I'm not so sure BluesMaster. Or should I call you... Mr Balague? I joke.

@Leif gets my vote. He's been a great poster all month and always has a good point to make. Honourable mention to @, @Rmpr and @CHOULO19, who were all great posters this month too.

Happy New Year, fellow Chelsea fans! And what a fucking year for Chelsea it was! I hope you all have some beautiful memories left over from 2012. And I hope even more so that you live some wonderful moments in 2013. HAPPY NEW YEAR TO YOU ALL AT TALKCHELSEA!

I don't want to get into it but he usually get most of the votes even if he hasn't played well.

I don't think Balague wrote this... Atlético Madrid is spelt incorrectly. It's actually spelt the same way most English people spell it, which is Athletico Madrid.

If they're a good player and would improve the first-team, then I don't care what nationality they are. The only reason I might agree with this is because we need more home-grown players, especially with Sturridge leaving.

Luiz makes mistakes, just like any other player. He also does many good things, just like most other players. But until recently we always played him as a centre-back, so people were fairly intolerant of his mistakes, which is understandable. Now Luiz is playing in midfield but people are used to focusing on his mistakes and I think it's a bit harsh to be honest. What really annoys me is that when we were playing against Leeds, we were having a torrid time in the first half and Lampard was already booked for a reckless challenge after 15 or so minutes. But whenever he made any more reckless challenges after that, people did not say he was idiot because he could have been sent off. They actually said he was making them proud. There was no 'he could have been sent off' or anything like that and Lampard was playing in the same position as Luiz did against Everton and it was even earlier in the match. Also, how Luiz can be blamed for Everton's goal, I have no idea. He was in the correct position and did nothing wrong and couldn't have prevented the goal in any way. It was Hazard who needlessly gave away the ball and Cole's god awful positioning that was at fault. But Hazard never gets criticized. He also gets the most MOTM votes even if he does fuck all for 90 minutes. Why should there be two double standards? Very, very annoying how some players get away without any criticism. Even though Mata is one of my favourite players, it annoys me that you can't fault him on here. I was actually surprised that some people were criticizing him. And to be fair, he was terrible for the first thirty minutes but so was every other player.

I think you're right with saying Oscar is the most likely to take on this role. His tactical awareness is actually very good and he has the intelligence to control the tempo of our play. I think he has all of the offensive attributes to perform the role but I don't think he has the defensive attributes quite yet. He's certainly not afraid of a challenge but he seems to dive into challenges a lot and needs to learn when and when not to go to ground. Having a deep-lying playmaker in a 4-2-3-1 system can be very awkward though, and it only seems to work a complete all-round players that are very creative. But there are only two players in the world that I can think of that perform that role expertly in a 4-2-3-1 (Xabi Alonsi and Schweinsteiger). If we used 4-3-3, I think it would work much better if we're going to insist on having Oscar in a deeper role, which I think we will. Eddie Newton confirmed that Oscar is highly regarded as the player we're going to use there over the coming years, but we're going to gradually move him into that role. Regarding playing time and development, I can't see Oscar's development being hampered too much. RDM was playing him a lot, but with no rotation. Benitez has stated clearly that his job was to come in and simply to win. He doesn't seem to have been entrusted with the task of player development. But when it comes to next season and we have either a new manager or Benitez has the job full-time, I'm sure Abramovich (or Emenalo) will be letting said manager know that the likes of Oscar and Hazard should be involved heavily in their plans. I'm not sure what the plans for KDB are but I can imagine him coming back to Chelsea next season and can see Marin being sold. Chelsea were adamant on sending KDB on loan for a season in the BPL, but that didn't happen. So I'm guessing he's held in fairly high regard and will be play a role in the first-team next season. Obviously, we can only speculate. Just my two cents.

How have you not been reported by now?

I don't want to get involved in these arguments, but I had to give this comment a like as it made me laugh. I really can't imagine Lamps would ever join another PL club. I'm guessing the most likely thing to happen if he didn't sign a new contract would be a move to LA Galaxy, so no need to worry.

Okay Mr Yeats, calm down. This incessant poetic arguing has gone beyond ridiculous at this point and I'm sick of it filling up every page. May I suggest letting some things go? Sometimes, people tend to have differing opinions you know? You're not obliged to write a ten page essay every time someone has an opinion that you don't agree with. And you can dress up those insults as much as you want but you're still as childish as the other users on here that call you a 'retard' or 'Torres fanboy' if you give Rafa or Torres any sort of praise. Slightly better language skills, but just as childish.

You do realise it is still illegal to rape someone even if they are above 17 years old?

I wonder if people called it 'ootba' before Lamps was born.

Grammar arguments? Really? Fucking hell. Oh, and retard is both a noun and verb.

I would love a more clinical strikers too but... come on. 80 goals? Since when does Messi play for Chelsea?

I'd prefer to see a full-strength team when we're on a good run. Why change too much? Maybe rest Mata for Oscar and Bertrand for Cole (if Bertrand is fit). I would give anything to see us thrash QPR.

Well, then my thanks go out to Fernando, because bringing Mata here is the best thing he has ever done at Chelsea!

I knew that much. I thought you meant he had made some changes in the facilities or something. Just found it interesting. I like a manager/club that cares about promoting youth players and put a lot of effort into their academy.

Link?

To be honest, the only way Luiz could have been sent off for those challenges was if we were playing against United. Most of them were necessary. The only foul he made that annoyed me was when an Everton player (can't remember who) had the ball by the corner flag and not going anywhere, then Luiz unnecessarily fouled. Was never a red card, but it was very annoying because it could have results in a goal as the free-kick was in a dangerous position.

I agree. But to be fair, every play acted like a leader today. They did me proud.

That was an extremely stressful match. But deserved or not, 3 points against Everton at Goodison Park. Absolutely delighted. I'm gonna give myself a relaxing evening and try my best to to analyze the match too much. There may have been mistakes from players, but they all worked their socks off for the full 90 mins. It was such a pleasure to see us defend in such a dedicated manner. A very happy Chelsea fan indeed!