Barbara

yep... the Cup match... I felt like literally banging my head on the wall.

nice moment between him and the Brazilian Chelsea boys after all conceding 6 goals is never easy...

conceding goals last season all I remember is Ivan against Swansea. nuff said

I never made the connection between Mazacar and goals conceded. I'm not sure if it's only them because our backs had some shameful displays last season, but you may have a point. Thanks for pointing it out.

I can remedy that I agree

you're the sweetest guy ever, thank you so much!

I don't think it passes through Mou's mind that in order to keep both him and Mata in the team, he'd have to move Oscar to the pivot, so Mata can be the CAM and have one of our wingers in the right wing. I don't think Mata is rated too highly with Mourinho - until he proves otherwise in the pitch (something Oscar already did), so I don't see him moving Oscar so deep because of Mata. If Mourinho decides Mata is better as an AM than Oscar I guess he'd be benched rather than go to the pivot. In addition to the reasons I'm about to explain to you, there's also the fact that it seems that Ramires-Lamps is untouchable under Mourinho for as long as Lamps can play. There's one thing Mourinho absolutely loves in his players: his defenders being capable of distributing and what he calls 'building' and his attacking players to defend. Based on that I guess we'd never see Luiz in the DM or Oscar in the pivot except for injury issues or during a match when he's ran out of subs. Mourinho prefers a CB that can do the transition and distribute well rather than make this player a DM because it's sort of part of the job description of the DM position to have a good pass, so why waste a CB that has a 'plus' compared to others and make him look trivial or mediocre or just another guy in a position where that's normal? The same applies to the attack. Why would he move one of his men attacking to the pivot and be average there - as players in the pivot are supposed to have good defensive skills, if he can have a guy with something else in the attack and that can offer him a sudden attack by tackling or intercepting the ball high in the pitch? He's said it many times in the past and since he arrived here, although he didn't touch the Oscar possibility - because nobody asked - he already made it clear that Luiz is a CB in his team and end of the story. The reasoning behind his choice is exactly the one I babbled presented to you. He does the same reasoning with attacking players - I'm trying to force my memory and see if I can remember someone he refused to do that in RM or Inter, but right now the closest case I can remember is Modric, but that's a bad example for many reasons (that we may talk about if you want) one of them being many people consider Modric more a midfielder than an attacking midfielder (I don't). But I won't deny it's a possibility. I'm not sold at the idea though. Right now I'd say play him as an AM or don't play him at all, but to be completely sure of that I would need (all of us actually, I suppose) to see him playing there a few matches in a row. Felipão may play him there tomorrow - supposing he plays in the first place - as in the training session he was injured he was playing in the pivot.

I think the main reason why Mata was an unused sub was because Mourinho saw the extra-time coming and he chose to space out his subs a bit more and then Hazard scored for us and with our team needing to literally defend the result bring Mata would be a suicide mission with his poor defending skills. Add that to the fact that we lost Rami during the 90 minutes and chances for him to come are even more unlikely. Also we were able to create chances (we could have scored a goal or two between Oscar's sitter and a couple of saves by Neuer). We only really parked the bus in the second half of the extra time because we had to and Bayern was pressuring us a lot. That said, I don't disagree about Mourinho not being clear about Mata - he hasn't. While he was praising other players and being very emphatic on Luiz not leaving the club, he was mild and many times simply refused to address Mata. He'd say a 4-5 words sentence to answer questions about Mata and change the topic or wait for the next question. Who knows Mourinho's antics caught it easily. It's the half-truths he says all the time (and imo also his great likeness to Oscar and his work rate) that make me unsure of how he'll use Mata. I've learned reticent Mourinho about any subject is never a good sign and gosh, was he reticent about Mata at many points?

If I had to rate the players work-rate and defence production I'd rate Mata at 5 and Willian at 6.5 - and I feel like being nice to Mata with that 5 rating. On the bold parts I think you guys covered basically everything I'd cover myself. Yes, his work rate is considerably better because he's more athletic, but also faster. He presses more than Mata does. So if the ball is lost in his territory he's the kind of guy that turns around quickly and starts pressing the ball. But he has a problem - sometimes he seems 'to forget' to do it, which is why he doesn't make the 7 rating imo. So the fact he's faster, more willing to press, and more athletic than Mata already puts him ahead of the Spaniard regarding this. Also I agree with both of you who said Mata is much better a #10 than he is. This may be an unpopular opinion - or maybe I don't make much sense - but at the end of the day it could be that Mata is splitting more matches with Willin in the RW than in the middle with Oscar. I may be wrong, but I feel like Oscar might be Mourinho's favorite player in the squad (although I think he rates Eden higher in terms of talent and potential). So unless Oscar starts playing sub-par or Mata changes completely his work rate from the last two seasons (Hazard himself improved a lot on it, already under Benitez, but more significantly already under Mourinho imo) I think Mourinho may favor a partnership of Oscar and Hazard + another and this 'another' could be Mata, Willian or Schürrle. Of course there will be plenty of matches Oscar won't start and a few he might not play at all. The same may happen with Eden. But along with Cech, Luiz and Ramires, I think those two are going to be the players to start most matches for us this season. Ivan and Lamps might be close seconds and I think there will be some sort of more often rotation between Terry and Cahill. I think Eto'o will start a lot, but Mourinho won't give up on Fernando so soon and he has to allow Ba to play the odd match. As for Mata I honestly don't know where he stands. I could be wrong in my Oscar assessment, but given what I know about Mou, what both him and Oscar had said about each other (especially Mou's words) I just feel like that. Also let's look a bit to Mou's Madrid. Ronaldo was even worse at work rate than Mata is; di María was quite decent and even Benzema and Pipita pressed a lot. Ozil really depended on the day. the biggest difference? Their pivot is much better at defending than ours. Although Lamps and Ramires are better than Khedira and Alonso in some things (Alonso is slow, Khedira distribution is awful - although Alonso makes up for it x10, they didn't offered much coming to the attack [scoring or assisting, except Xabi's eventual perfect cross]). Their counter-attack style relied on Alonso giving amazing long passes or Khedira passing to Alonso, di Maria, Ronaldo or Ozil. Because of the quality of their AM and Xabi's passing their transition was smooth and worked in the counter. But their pressing was high and good with the exception of Ronaldo. We don't have the same pressing quality - yet, I guess, but it'll come and I guess soon - but mainly we don't have a double pivot as solid defensively as Alonso-Khedira imo. Rami-Lamps are more b2b players with above the average attacking resources, but not exactly defending. We need our AM to press and tackle more than RM did because of that. Again, it's only my opinion and take on this. That favors Oscar style and the reason why I think Mou keeps affording Lamps in the team. Yep. No matter if he's in the bench or starting he has to play in the middle. We have plenty of options for the wings now and Willian is really good with both feet so he can alternate positions with Eden during the match more naturally than Oscar does.

congratulations!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! on the college thing, the pinky part I'm sorry

I'm really happy to read about the strategies and philosophy in the club now. It's a good investment - to sign the players when they're potentials and consequently less expensive - and then give them chances to keep developing until they're ready to finish their development with us, especially with a master in polishing gems like José Mourinho. Everything seems to be coming together, great timing (getting Emenalo in place, Roman's change of vision, Mourinho joining and the signings themselves). I do hope they really start taking the Academy more seriously - and it won't be just nice words to get a few thumb ups - England desperately need to revive their academies and I'd feel so proud if we were the pioneers doing that. I want to have more cases like John Terry in the team. It's a respectful thing and England needs to keep its status as one of the big countries in football for EPL to continue to be successful.

I agree with this And because of the demographics of members here, a certain kind of silly posts is now popular because it appeases to teenagers and young people - which is no problem as everyone who's older than that have been 20 someday. Hence the massive support it sometimes have, because if anything this thread made it clear that the new trend of being silly isn't as popular as initially supposed. ************************************************************************************************************************** it was suggested to end the damn thing last thread, but it didn't make one of the options in the poll. Actually it was even said (joking or not I don't know) to have been decided between admins that this was going to be last 'award' granted. I like the 'like' system. One day I was out of likes and I wanted to agree with some posts and I quoted 25 of them saying I just agreed with them. My Mean Girls analogy yesterday keeps making sense ... also some of people (I can't say for everyone, but this person I'll give the example is one that is 'defending' the award - as if the actions I'm about to describe don't make it clear where they stand) here pretending they do not care about the award or popularity are lying. I remember one of them came moping in my PM saying they were upset I didn't vote on them the first poll I participated and I had to explain in clear English that's because I like The Skipper's posts more than theirs - as if the vote itself wasn't a clear indication of that (although I also said the 'award' was stupid - that was three months ago). How ridiculous and pathetic that is? It might be in one of the many, many, many PM's I have printscreened and saved so maybe I should look through the endless files and post it here to illustrate what I mean (without exposing the poster's identity). it's validation, and it's not only for the teenagers because I'm not even talking about one of the teens... The award is passed its due date imo. Time to grow up... as I said I've never seen this kind of award in any other forums I go - and trust me I go or used to go in many of them. For as long as the thing exists some people will mold their posts to win the damn thing. Remove the 'award' and some posters' daily post account might even decrease from night to day. Remove the like feature and the serve will notice the difference... it's as transparent as clean water... Maybe we should keep the like system and remove only the reputation part? I still think the like feature is useful to show agreement and avoid unnecessary posts, but it seems like some people will hold onto anything remotely involving recognition and popularity, so maybe remove it will benefit the forum more than keeping it this is so spot on. That was when I stopped going to the Pub - the day I went there and it was LITERALLY a gif contest. Didn't complain at the time and left because well, the title there says it all "The Pub - post anything" so they were doing what they should, but it shows how things are working him lately and why the gifs and the stupid posting left the community board and is slowly making it into other places.

I'm laughing for real at the transparency of this whole thing. It reminds me of the movie Mean Girls - a chick flick, so probably most of you haven't watched - about a high school queen b and her minions. I could use a gif to show one of the scenes, but given the subject that would be I agree with Tiwaz in the name-calling. It was all over the place - but I guess ever since the mods really started warning threads it's got better... but it's still a shame that they need to literally patrol threads for that kind of stuff. And yeah, obviously it hasn't been about the MOTM subject alone anymore - because the thread (the voting thread) started a subject that many members have been bothered about and that reflects in the momt voting. Open a thread to talk about it and the subject will be moved there - it felt like it fit here because the whole motm charade started because people with quality weren't getting recognized - which soon became about how it's more and more less about quality here these days. now that I disagree. Almost every thread don't have those problems. It's a few of them - at least among the ones I read on a daily basis (my fave players' threads, Mourinho thread, matches threads, international and english football threads). also your last line is the whole point of the discussion. Discussing topics is the purpose of forums in general. It's becoming less and less about discussing football and more and more about personal attacks and else. edit: in all this mess I forgot to congratulate The Skipper aka the only reason I've been voting on this recently. Now that I know Peace. won it twice already, my last vote ever in this 'award' belonged to our Dutch gem.

:worship: :worship: Sherry, sometimes it's hard to believe you're 16, sweetie. You're way too good! We need more teens like you in the world That was a heck of an analysis about the team. Even if I don't care - at all - about Brazil NT, I must admit you made me have the 'feels'. I've watched the second half in a TV replay yesterday because I wanted to see Rami - everyone was praising him on the sports show I watch every day. Felipão is actually someone that is honest beyond doubts, since he resumed his position as the coach I felt compelled to give more attention to the team. I'm not implying Mano wasn't honest, but I feel like he was manipulated a lot out of naivety and inexperience. Felipão won't let those bastards at CBF (Brazilian footie federation) play him, so I guess that's a team I can support knowing the players are there for merit, not because of some shady business.

@Bir_CFC, I knew I had misspelled your member id! Too many letters that don't form a word my memory just skips. I enjoy your posts a lot, mate. You should definitely post more if you have the time edit: I don't think The Pub is a problem. It's only a thread, if you don't like it, don't go there. The thing lately it feels like The Pub style has been brought to other places... who wants to talk seriously about Chelsea is spammed with gifs and jokes, not to mention the members-wars that more often than not involve a poster from there. If you criticize it, boom, you're the anti-fun member who hates the pubbers. Which is not true in many cases I'm sure. There should be certain rules to allow the gifs only in the community board for example as it bothers people who don't really see the purpose (other than overload the server), the fun or whatever else in other parts of the forum. Also others have a slower connection and they slow loading a page a lot. The exception of course would be CFC-gifs related like goals, or when Mourinho kissed the badge during the press conference... but the joke gifs shouldn't be brought to the CFC board. Just a suggestion though. But the problem goes deeper than that imo, but maybe that's a first step... Another one would be going to a real pub to have some real fun

so I know I'm shameless to ask this - but for us living literally overseas it's hard to get a copy (if the packaging is terrible there, imagine until it arrives on brazil) but I'd love to read Oscar's interview and Mourinho's Q&A - so if it's not too much to ask, could any of you guys maybe scan those?

btw, if this about democracy I feel like the option "abolish the award" should have been included in the poll.

this, everything, but especially the bold. Just like in high school - and I wonder how much that influenced on this award existing in the first place - it comes down to popularity. Guys like Peace. don't feel the need to be popular and consequently isn't the kind of profile that will make it to the poll or win it. It's been quantity over quality as you suggested in your previous post. The Skipper is a guy who has both things imo. But I guess their main point here is that not only contributions about football should be taken into consideration. I think the staff should take it a little bit more seriously when many different people are complaining about how things are here right now and where they're heading and stop to think just for a little bit why is that. You're not the 1st, 2nd, 5th or maybe not even the 10th member I read complaining how things changed around here (in the last 3 weeks or so). Some quantified it saying the change happened about 1 or 1-1/2 year from now (I can't say because I'm here only for 3 months). More often than not those people complain about quality. I guess it's obvious what's happening and it seems it'll only get worse. But hey, at least it will be fun, right? The thing is I've never seen anyone saying the 'old days' here used to be boring or lacked fun. It's just a new trend that invaded it here and it seems like now it's supposed to be 'fun' (I can think of another word that would be more appropriate) more than it's supposed to be about Chelsea. It affected even the football discussions... I understand that the club became global in the last few years and that there are a lot of new football fans all around the world and it also has an influence, but I think it's the vision that is changing. At some point people won't bother to complain anymore and will leave. And then the least relevant thing - or among the less relevant things - might be football - which is a shame and also sad as this still is the best place to talk about Chelsea among the other CFC forums I know. And then the people like you who complained based in the past - or me who complains based on what it is now without a reference of how it used to be, but enough to know things are weird - are labeled many things. but I've never exchanged a PM with you or with any of the guys I've seen complaining about the same thing (Amels just had the same complaint a few posts after yours). We aren't a secret club targeting a certain group. It's happening for everyone to see, but then we're moaners, the anti-fun committee, the pretentious or whatever else I've read around (can't remember), but it's odd to see a place named Talk Chelsea reinforcing some of things being reinforced here lately. But nobody stops to think that people from different ages, from different countries, who joined the forums on different times are all complaining about quality... It seems people just roll their eyes and think 'there come the moaners' (or whatever), but won't stop to think the moaners are growing and they might as well as leave at some point... Also people shouldn't confuse fun with silliness and childish behavior. Though those three things may be easy to be mixed, they are not the same. and I see more of the last two than the first here... But you make a complain about the environment here and 10 people come saying you're whatever they want to think you are and don't even stop to think if your complaint makes sense in the first place... Also most people don't care about this poll. There are about 150 registered members (statistically speaking it's probably much more - just compare the amount of votes in the Man of the match) coming here every day and this poll has about 30 votes, sometimes 40 votes (like this month that was nearly 50 I guess). This is how much people care about an award that only exists in TC (at least I've never seen something similar in the many tennis, movies, literature, TV shows, Chelsea and football forums I've been part throughout the years). And before a word is said about 'this kind of post' I'm not here supposing I own the truth or that I'm better than someone else or whatever... it's just that people seem to overlook the many complaints in different threads and boards that are slowly spreading throughout the forum. I can't say for someone else, but I'm not against fun - and even some mild silliness (I'm the queen of silly, it would be contradictory to say I hate silliness when I'm a silly person). But Talk Chelsea is changing and I wonder if there will be a breaking point where it'll be less to talk about Chelsea in a realistic and thoughtful way than it'll be about something else... /rant edit: only after I posted I realized this thread already had two pages. So many quality posts here by zolayes, DDA, Amels, Term X. So yeah, it seems a lot of us still want to talk Chelsea mostly here... And one thing about the quantity... as I said The Skipper posts quite often and it isn't too much - sometimes I even want him to post more. (he isn't a babbler like me, although I really posted too much during my first month, getting used to the forum, getting to know people, etc... [it was a shameful amount of 1200 posts in one month and then 1100 split in the next two - and if things continue as they are, it'll be less and less]). So the quantity someone posts isn't a problem, it's what it's in those posts regardless if they're 70/day or 7/day. If TorontoChelsea, The Skipper, bir_c (I guess I misspelled it), Peace., DDA among others decide to post 100 posts a day I'll happily read them all. Sometimes I even re-read their posts and I've learned so much about football in those three months with you guys, for real.

now that's how a player who is professional and aware of his age behaves in a situation like this. I'm impressed by his maturity and patience. If we rejected loans on him is because they have plans for him, as they should!

the first good news coming from international football week.

Willian is a winger - or a striker (played like that on few occasions). When he played through the middle it was more often like a false 9, or a second striker than as a #10. He's a not what I would call a #10, even if plays through the middle. He belongs to the wings though and unlike a few players we have in our team that only have one foot, he has two football feet, which doesn't compromise switching wings during the match. Of course he's not terrible in the #10, but he's far from Oscar and Mata level, so why? That's the main reason he played in the wings or as a second striker in Shakhtar more than as a #10

it's 5pm and I've just arrived home. It took me five minutes to understand it. I completely forgot you're from Portugal, Well, I think the 3-4 players we may not have (compared to the first list of players called) may be less important than Cris not playing for you. Also you guys always beat us (lately) so it wouldn't be a surprise I just don't want Oscar to get a knock - winning or losing is the least important thing in a friendly 10 months away from the WC

yep

Oscar said after the match that he hopes to play against Portugal because according to him is an important match. He also said if today's was important he would have played, but the physios decided to give him a couple of days more of rest. He said he isn't 100% yet, but he's ready to play. I wish he didn't play - I really can't consider a match this far from the WC to be important, but I think he will play even if he isn't 100% fit. He said yesterday he was 50% and it continues to progress, so he'll probably be close to 100% against Portugal though I'm not sure when (tuesday or wednesday) the match is

thank you! I really like gifs now and then, but it's been completely overdone lately (among other things). I don't mind them in threads like this and in threads in the Community board (one I visit less and less), but in the CFC board sometimes they're annoying as heck... but you know, nobody will say it although a lot of people think the same. so I'm glad you did because of course, if I did it first I would get retaliated - I still will, but I won't read it either way depending on who it comes from. I also agree with the first part, it's a silly thing (juvenile even), but believe me some people take it very seriously... I remember I upset people with my first vote here. I always vote for The Skipper. When he wins, if this still happens (I still don't know if this month's is the last or not) and I still bother I'll vote for Peace. then. I love Peace.'s posts to the bits, but I decided to stick with The Skipper until he wins. And then I decided I wouldn't take part of the silliness anymore... but for Peace. I could make an exception thanks for the mention