The Big Drog

Nic was/is a very talented player but I don't think he was ever cut out to be the main man at a top club. Well, with Drogba as our main man, the club has experienced the most success in its entire history and even when he is playing shit he can always create something out of nothing (part of his greatness).

Well then I don't think much of the article.

Tbf mate, we are going to be sans Cole, Ramires and Drogba with Terry and Lampard doubts to make it, on top of that we are currently playing shit so the pessimism isn't that unbelievable.

The tone of the message just seemed a bit negative for my liking. I don't think you can say with 100%accuracy that Didier's personality is the reason that the strikers we have bought failed. In the case of Torres, his speed (his main asset) is gone and his confidence is shot to pieces. In the case of Shevchenko he was past his best and struggled to adapt from the more tactical Seria A to the quicker, more physical Premier League.

Or you could be thankful at just how great Didier Drogba has been for our club for a number of years, greatness only magnified by consistently poor performances of Torres, you get a real grasp of just how much Drogba has meant to us down through the years.

I thought we looked better with Drogba in the team and anyway we all know he is capable of producing the big performances for Chelsea. And even if you want to push all of that aside, Id rather have a genuine Chelsea legend starting up front than the biggest waste of money in football history.

He definitely isn't the least of our worries. With Drogba gone, this was the time he was supposed to step up, take on the mantle of being Chelsea's main man, he has been awful, the results have been average and we are clinging on to 4th spot. Excuse me if Im not jumping for joy about our 50 million pound striker.

Maybe if we write a letter pleading with the Ivorian FA and with Didier himself to return from the ACON then we might actually stand a chance. However assuming that doesn't happen then it will be Torres up front again and you can't see this going any other way but a Man Utd win.

Please Roman make the bad man go away.

I understand that we don't want to rush Lukaku and that he isn't the finished article yet but surely he could play a few games in the absences of Didier Drogba and Fernando Torres. Given the price we paid for him, I don't think Im expecting to much for him to be trusted to play a few games, I don't think it is unreasonable.

Stats are great. When Tores produces the type of performances that Didier did against Valencia and Man City, maybe then he might earn the right to be called Didier's rightful replacement.

Im excited about this signing. He is a talented, technically proficient player who should add more to the AVB side than the likes of Malouda or Kalou.

After watching all of his goals for Liverpool I feel even more depressed.

Depressing. Really depressing. When we signed him I had such high expectations, it must have been one of my happiest moments as a football fan, that transfer deadline day, I still remember the entire day so clearly, getting all of these updates from friends, checking the Sky Sports website, hearing stories that the deal was off, hearing that it was on ect. When we finally got him it brought an emotion of near euphoria but then he stepped onto the pitch and that euphoria has just dripped away to the point where now, 12 months on, I've gone from euphoric to feeling downright depressed whenever I see him on the pitch in a Chelsea jersey. Depressed at how poorly he plays, depressed that our club wasted so much money on him, depressed for the player himself who must have had such high expectations when he came to Chelsea of finally winning trophies at club level, its become a pretty horrible experience, watching him play, willing him to score, hoping against hope that he will recapture those glory days but knowing deep down that it will never happen, that his best days are behind him and what we are left with is a shadow of the force that powered Spain to Euro 2008 victory.

Cech Ivanovic, Cahill, Terry, Cole Ramires, Romeu, Meireles Sturridge, Torres, Mata I don't think AVB will experiment with the team that much.

Hopefully we accept Fiorentina's incoming bid for him and he leaves before the end of the window. He is bad, so very bad. He did well during the double winning campaign, fair play to him but he offers virtually nothing on the left flank or in midfield, surely a club with our aspirations can do better than Florent Malouda.

Mate he has definitely lost his pace. Check out Torres circa 2006-2008 and then watch a game with current day Torres, the difference is staggering. Its isn't unexpected though, given the amount of problems he has had with injuries, in particular his knees, it has destroyed that extra yard of killer pace he had.

Obviously it isn't solely Fernando's fault for the result yesterday, nobody putting forward a logical argument could claim it was. However, I don't know about the rest of you, but usually when your club spends 50 million pounds (a British transfer record no less) on a player, you would expect him to have a reasonably positive effect against teams like Norwich. These days it is nothing short of depressing to watch Torres play, I was honestly a big fan of him in his pomp, he was wonderful to watch, just like so many non Arsenal fans enjoyed watching Henry, a lot of people enjoyed watching Torres. These days it is exactly the opposite, you are so desperately willing him to do well but it seems to inevitably fall flat. I accept that the current squad and system maybe aren't ideal to what he needs. All the same though, that still justify such a poor performance yesterday or such glaring misses as the one yesterday. At a club, and in a system, where for the best part of 7 years we have had the finest all round lone striker in the world I suppose my expectations have become a bit too lofty, all the same when the replacement for the great man is 50 million world cup and euro 2008 winner Fernando Torres, I do hope you can forgive me for my disappointment at his crushingly dispirited displays. We are now left with a 27(28?) year old striker who has lost his main asset (pace), who has virtually no confidence whatsoever and the lingering memory of one of the greatest strikers of his generation casting a shadow over every striker who wears the Chelsea jersey. A few years ago, had you asked me, who in my wildest most unrealistic dreams would I like to replace Drogba with (if necessary) and my answer would have taken a split second, I would have picked Fernando Torres. I know now that maybe its better if dreams stay just that, because in reality it has been a nightmare.

Its not a given that we will beat Napoli, it is far from it. They are a very talented side who will be set up in a shape which our team wont be very accustomed to playing against. They are one of the toughest teams we could have drawn to play at this stage and the result is far more up in the air than seems to be the consensus here. Our chances of winning it? If we can get past Napoli then we will have to see who we get in the draw. It is very obvious though that Real Madrid and Barcelona are on a different level to us, and probably Bayern Munich too. Maybe with a kind draw we could reach the semi finals, wouldn't be overly surprised though if we didn't get that far, I fully expect the competition winners to come from pain, where the only two outstanding teams in the world reside.

I doubt Cahill will be thrown in at the deep end, I expect it to be Cech Ivanovic, Luiz, Terry, Cole Ramires, Romeu, Lampard Sturridge, Torres, Mata

What are these quotes from the BBC? I cant find them online.

Often he doesn't play the full 90, Im not sure why because he has shown that he can do it for Germany for the full 90 but Mourinho likes to take him off, that being said he did play the full 90 in the last game against Mallorca and entered a wonderful second half performance, including a sublime assist for Higuain's goal.

I enjoyed this article that I found on ESPN.com and found it to be the best in describing just how important Mesut Ozil is to the Real Madrid team. By Michael Cox. Jose Mourinho's task at Real Madrid is far from simple. Charged with overtaking Barcelona after three seasons of Catalan domination in La Liga, he's also expected to do it in style. Barca has been regarded as the greatest side of the modern era for the method of its success as well as the success itself. It's odd to have this debate when Real sits top of the league with more goals scored than any other side. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but it's fair to say that "beautiful football" is not quite the same as "attacking football." A goals scored column does not reflect how attractive the style of play is. If anything, it indicates the outright quality and relentlessness of the side. Mourinho has faced accusations of boring football in the past. His Porto and Inter sides that won the European Cup were more proactive and creative over the course of a league season than they suggested in the latter stages of the Champions League. If anything, it was his Chelsea side that played the least inspiring football. In his first season in London, Mourinho based his side around a strong defense; in a stark contrast from the current situation at Real, Chelsea hadn't won the league for 50 years and was happy to take success however it arrived. Even when it scored goals, Chelsea smashed teams with brute force and pace rather than carving them apart methodically. Didier Drogba was a battering ram, the team's flanks had the speed of Arjen Robben andDamien Duff, and the middle contained a physical trio ofFrank Lampard, Michael Essien and Claude Makelele. Nowhere was there a playmaker. Lampard specialized in powerful running and goal scoring, while Robben was a very different player to the one we now know -- he spent much of the time in his own half doing his defensive duties then sped along the line rather than coming inside. Real Madrid is different. Mourinho's current side has, on a good day, three clear playmakers -- and that's not including Cristiano Ronaldo. Xabi Alonso is the deep-lying creator, quite rightly one of the most widely appreciated players in the modern game. Angel Di Maria plays a hybrid role, coming inside from the flank to take up central positions. Then there is Mesut Ozil, now literally as well as figuratively a "number ten." Ozil, though, is the only one who will always be a playmaker; he can't do any other job. When Real comes up against a side as strong -- which generally means Barca -- Alonso becomes a midfield scrapper as much as a playmaker and Di Maria becomes a defensive winger more than an attacking threat. Therefore, Ozil shoulders so much of a burden for making Real an aesthetically pleasing side. In truth, this campaign hasn't been the best for him. His form has been indifferent, he looks even more gloomy than usual, and a few times he's been shoved out to the right. Meanwhile, Kaka is lurking in the background. Kaka is an immensely talented player but one who doesn't offer anything like the artistry of Ozil. Indeed, Kaka's style over the year has often been misunderstood. Though a Brazilian and an attacking midfielder, in his days at Milan it was Andrea Pirlo, Clarence Seedorf and often Rui Costa doing the playmaking. Kaka's speciality was a quick turn of pace. He'd get the ball, roar past a defender and finish nicely. He was essentially a striker playing a little deeper. That was a perfectly stylish way to finish chances, but physically Kaka has changed. He's gone from being a slender player to a much bulkier one. He looks more like a number nine than a number ten, physically more similar to Karim Benzema than Ozil. In the past two years, the change in his body shape is remarkable. He doesn't have that sudden acceleration, and he can't speed past players. It's difficult to say what he really excels at. With Kaka only a substitute, Ozil played his first league game of 2012 last weekend, Real's 5-1 win over Granada. The postmatch reaction to his performance was muted, yet he assisted three of the four goals scored in his 67 minutes on the pitch -- the first a brilliant improvised flick to help a Ronaldo ball onto Benzema. Kaka got his chance in the cup in midweek but lasted just 45 minutes against Malaga before he was withdrawn by Mourinho, another wasted chance. It is Ozil that makes the side play, and his appreciation of space is incredible. He has a phenomenal ability to drift between the lines and find himself free. So often you could pause the game and draw a triangle or a square around the three or four players closest to him; Ozil would be precisely in the center. It's a difficult thing to quantify, difficult to outline why being five yards from the midfield and five yards from the defense is significantly better to being, say, seven yards from the midfield and three yards from the defence, but at this level, margins like that matter. His thinking in such situations doesn't stop there. When one of the opposing players realizes Ozil is free and moves toward him, Ozil recognizes he's now being tracked and replicates his opponent's movement to keep a good distance between himself and his marker. There's two effects of that. First, the other opposition players see he's being tracked by a teammate so don't bother picking him up, despite the fact that the defender is never in control of the situation. Second, the opponent becomes dragged out of position to leave a gap for someone else to exploit. It sounds simple enough on paper, but it's more difficult to combine this constant movement with the actual concept of playing football -- getting the ball, creating chances. He's not just playing tag. With Ronaldo and Di Maria in a line of three, Ozil is beside two players who love coming inside. Many typical number tens would find this frustrating. Ozil instead helps the side retain fluidity by moving to the outside. In particular, when a lateral ball is played to a Real fullback from one of the central midfielders, Ozil will make an arced run into that same channel. It's an unusual movement, going away from the dangerous central area of the pitch, and neither the opposition holding midfielder nor the relevant fullback knows who should be tracking him. In the confusion, it's often Ronaldo or Di Maria who can then make the opposite run and be the one in a dangerous position, ending up with the glory. Few other players in football give the impression of always thinking. Ozil is always glancing around him, always looking over his shoulder to see where the space is. He's so concerned with making sure defenders don't track him that he occasionally does something Thierry Henry used to do in his Arsenal days, drifting out wide to the touchline and standing still, as if disinterested from the game, before bursting into life. Does it work? Rarely. Defenders aren't that stupid, but it shows Ozil's mentality, how he's constantly trying to get some space, trying to escape the attention of defenders. Hopefully, he won't escape the attention of his coach. Mourinho has tried to play two strikers, he is giving chances to Kaka, and he wants to make the most of Di Maria. Those players can help win the league, but only Ozil has the ability to transform Real into a truly exceptional side

I definitely think a title challenge is out of the question this season. We are way too far off the pace to l;a credible title challenge at this stage, our priority in the league is securing a top 4 finish. In terms of the Champions League I hope we can beat Napoli, but over two legs it will be very tough and they will pose a very serious threat to us, if we do make it through I cant see us beating Real Madrid, Barcelona or Bayern Munich, all of whom are on a completely different level to us. Essien might help but at his age, with the injuries he has had, Im not expecting him to pull up trees. The defence is pretty shambolic, it's a million miles away from what it once was under Mourinho. We still aren't scoring freely either, Torres has showed some promising signs lately but to say he is "back at his best" is a vast overstatement and the midfield problem remains, Romeu is an excellent holding midfielder who should start ahead of Essien, Ramires offers a lot of energy, Lampard, though he isn't as effective as he once was, is still a goal scoring threat but the big problem is still a lack of creativity through the middle and the over-reliance on Mata to constantly single handedly create some thing, as good a player as he is, it's too much to ask of him, it also doesn't help that he is stuck out on the wing when he would be far more effective through the centre. He cant be moved into the centre until we find a decent left winger who can go past people (aka not Florent Malouda)

Im amazed that people are actually questioning the talent of Ronaldo. He dominated the Premier League, he is currently dominating La Liga, he is an unbelievable player by any standard and the jewel in the greatest team in the world right now, Real Madrid. btw Gil, I think that Torres has proven the "class is permanent" phrase to be completely false.