AVB out? seriously?

[Tomo 21,733]

I have so much i want to say on this topic and when i mean much i mean to the extent that i will most likely be here till christmas if i say everybit i need to say so i will try and keep this as brief as humanly possible.

Things have not gone exactly to plan no, but are you seriously telling me you prefered the shit we were in last season to now? we were all begging for a creative player last summer, we now have Mata and to a lesser extent Meireles. We were all crying when we thought Sturridge would never get a chance and eventually leave, he is now a regular, thriving and IMO behind Rooney the best striker England have right now. We were all cursing last season when Carlo would not rotate and drop underperforming players, AVB has done that numerous times this season. We wanted the average age of our squad slashed down, AVB has done that. RDM has been bring back aswell.

If we were offered all of those things above this time last year we would have snapped the guys hand off and thanked god for loving Chelsea.

Will AVB going and Hiddink coming in solve all our problems? no, it might give us a short term buzz (might being the key word) but long term is not the answer Hiddink will be 70 in a few years FFS and although he is a great manager he is not superman, he could not prevent Turkey getting smashed at home by Croatia for crying out loud, whats to say he would have prevented us losing yesterday or to Arsenal?

We are playing better football, the first 30 minutes at Bolton especially was a delight. Arsenal a couple of years ago showed that a bad record against competitive rivals might cost you a chance of the title but it alone won't cost you a top 4 place. What we are better at doing than Spurs, Liverpool and Arsenal is "sweeping up" against the "lesser sides" which is what will keep us above them and in the top 4 even if we don't beat a competitive rival all season (like Arsenal didn't in 2009/2010).

The comparision's with Scolari are just stupid. You could say the record against the top teams which yes it's true to a extent but performance levels are otherwise, under Big Phil we deserved to lose all the big games this season it could quite easily have gone the other way. Under Big Phil was the only time in the Roman era we were not "sweeping up" against "lesser sides" at The Bridge, teams like West Ham, Newcastle (when they were shit), Tottenham (when they were shit), Southend and Burnley were coming to The Bridge and not only holding us but doing it with ultimate ease even Stoke had the easiest 88 minutes of their life until somehow we popped up with 2 injury time goals. Right now we don't seem to be having that problem under AVB.

Also lets remember Scolari took over a team at the peak off their powers, AVB has took over us after pound for pound our worst season for a long long time.

As for us not finishing in the top 4 please stop over-reacting and take a quick look at the table on March 1st last season and compare it to May.

In 2001/2002 christmas time Manchester United were 9th, just saying. 7 teams won a league match at Old Trafford that season (including Chelsea, Liverpool AND Arsenal). United then are in a similar position to us now, again just saying.

rant over, have a good night,

[LDN Blue 7,903]

Fully agree.

Villas-Boas needs the time he's been promised!

[Wilson 358]

I can't believe you posted this mate, I can see why you have but it gets boring. Big deal we have lost 4 games under AVB, people think managers can just work magic within 1 season. It's going to take time for us and AVB to adapt. Sacking manager after manager is no good. Don't bat an eye lid to what papers are saying, anything to sell a fucking story.

[Blue Armour 4,286]

I have so much i want to say on this topic and when i mean much i mean to the extent that i will most likely be here till christmas if i say everybit i need to say so i will try and keep this as brief as humanly possible.

Things have not gone exactly to plan no, but are you seriously telling me you prefered the shit we were in last season to now? we were all begging for a creative player last summer, we now have Mata and to a lesser extent Meireles. We were all crying when we thought Sturridge would never get a chance and eventually leave, he is now a regular, thriving and IMO behind Rooney the best striker England have right now. We were all cursing last season when Carlo would not rotate and drop underperforming players, AVB has done that numerous times this season. We wanted the average age of our squad slashed down, AVB has done that. RDM has been bring back aswell.

If we were offered all of those things above this time last year we would have snapped the guys hand off and thanked god for loving Chelsea.

Will AVB going and Hiddink coming in solve all our problems? no, it might give us a short term buzz (might being the key word) but long term is not the answer Hiddink will be 70 in a few years FFS and although he is a great manager he is not superman, he could not prevent Turkey getting smashed at home by Croatia for crying out loud, whats to say he would have prevented us losing yesterday or to Arsenal?

We are playing better football, the first 30 minutes at Bolton especially was a delight. Arsenal a couple of years ago showed that a bad record against competitive rivals might cost you a chance of the title but it alone won't cost you a top 4 place. What we are better at doing than Spurs, Liverpool and Arsenal is "sweeping up" against the "lesser sides" which is what will keep us above them and in the top 4 even if we don't beat a competitive rival all season (like Arsenal didn't in 2009/2010).

The comparision's with Scolari are just stupid. You could say the record against the top teams which yes it's true to a extent but performance levels are otherwise, under Big Phil we deserved to lose all the big games this season it could quite easily have gone the other way. Under Big Phil was the only time in the Roman era we were not "sweeping up" against "lesser sides" at The Bridge, teams like West Ham, Newcastle (when they were shit), Tottenham (when they were shit), Southend and Burnley were coming to The Bridge and not only holding us but doing it with ultimate ease even Stoke had the easiest 88 minutes of their life until somehow we popped up with 2 injury time goals. Right now we don't seem to be having that problem under AVB.

Also lets remember Scolari took over a team at the peak off their powers, AVB has took over us after pound for pound our worst season for a long long time.

As for us not finishing in the top 4 please stop over-reacting and take a quick look at the table on March 1st last season and compare it to May.

In 2001/2002 christmas time Manchester United were 9th, just saying. 7 teams won a league match at Old Trafford that season (including Chelsea, Liverpool AND Arsenal). United then are in a similar position to us now, again just saying.

rant over, have a good night,

Agree with that point..

Also feel that apart from the Arsenal match (which was a big failure tactics-wise) he's been unlucky against the rest of the big 4, and in that QPR matc,.

Though having said that, I think its not too much to expect more consistency from his team for at least the next two months...If he can't do that, (namely what Spurs and Newcastle are doing atm),then his methods will be rightly called into question...

[DYC. 7,542]

He really needs to settle on a starting XI though. The constant changes really harm the building of chemistry between the players. Rotation is good but this is too much.

[Peace. 4,352]

He really needs to settle on a starting XI though. The constant changes really harm the building of chemistry between the players. Rotation is good but this is too much.

Especially the defense. It is never twice the same... Excepted Cole lol.

[incometax 116]

attacking football with rameries mikel and lampard as your mids, makes me question his awareness. If he came out with the right tactics or impact subs that have worked more than twice this season I would see his glimpses of potential, but im not impressed. And if you cite his record at porto I will laugh, Porto is an amazingly run club from top to bottom, the way its set up I could win a double there . I will give him the benefit of doubt for now and still back him(I AM NOT YET CALLING FOR HIS SACKING THATS JUST DUMB), but im curious how chelsea will look when he gets the players he wants. First thing he can do to really impress me is show some balls and put some of the older players who are being played cause of reputation on the bench.

[Tomo 21,733]

First thing he can do to really impress me is show some balls and put some of the older players who are being played cause of reputation on the bench.

So Lampard, Malouda, Anelka and Drogba have started every match they have been avalible this season? Kalou wasn't taken off after 36 minutes?

[zolayes 14,489]

As long as TX calls for AVB to be sacked then I KNOW we must stick with him

[Kieran. 6,317]

Those who are calling for AVB's head need to step back and think...what would sacking him now do?

Bringing in AVB was never going to be an instant success. We have to battle the likes of ManU and Man City with players such as Kalou and Malouda. For those saying he should have brought in more players this summer, he was hired at the end of the summer. If he had been hired right after Ancelotti was fired, our squad would look pretty different. Give AVB this winter and the following summer, and our squad is going to be playing the football AVB wants to play.

You have to be patient.

[manpe 10,861]

he was hired at the end of the summer.

At the end of summer? 22nd June doesn't sound like the end of summer... in fact, I'm not sure summer had actually officially begun yet And the team came back from holiday at the beginning of July, so it didn't affect his squad assessment.

[Term-X 7,891]

Forget the idealistic vision we have for AVB.

If that CL spot is in jeopardy, we need to go back to ‘boring boring’ Chelsea and play to our strengths. With Financial fair play looming, we simply cannot afford to finish outside the Champions league places, it's that simple.

[Kieran. 6,317]

Forget the idealistic vision we have for AVB.

If that CL spot is in jeopardy, we need to go back to ‘boring boring’ Chelsea and play to our strengths. With Financial fair play looming, we simply cannot afford to finish outside the Champions league places, it's that simple.

Agreed. We HAVE to qualify. As you stated, we simply cannot afford to not qualify.

[Henrique 9,133]

I said in another topic "axe on VB". I was angry in that time because of the defeat. Of course its too early to say ask AVB to leave.

But there is a big problem with the portuguese coach: nobody knows what he really is. I don't think that winning the portuguese league and Europe League makes him a great manager. Lets remember that Rafa Benitez won La Liga with Valencia and also the the Europe League ( UEFA Cup ), before winning UCL in his first season with Liverpool. I think its much more difficult to win La Liga with Valencia than winning portuguese league with Porto.

Some people here have a idealist vision of VB, you know, he is young, is supposed to play attacking football is portuguese and learned how to be a manager with Mourinho, the combination of Guardiola and Jose Mourinho, the perfect manager.

The big question is: if our form continue that bad, how an unproven 33 years old manager will convince the fans, the board, the owner and the players that he is the right man for the job?

[Rambo 1,729]

The onus is on the players to perform on a regular basis, I understand the new philosophy that AVB is trying to promote but I don't think we have the right players for that system atm.

[BlueLion. 21,491]

He won't be sacked, Roman wouldn't have spent the best part of £11 million on signing a manager to sack him five months down the line.

[Corazón De León 58]

Its the team we need to change, not the manager. The crap players have to get kicked out, not AVB.. Its his choice though, hes got to get the right players, settle on a starting 11, give the younger ones a chance as well (not just in the CC) I really do think Romeu deserves a start in the PL.. maybe against wolves this week? I hope so!

[Krypt 241]

Good post Tomo

When things are not going our way we tend to press the panic button. there are plenty of games to play , we just need to get a bit of a run together and the confidence will come. Christmas will be the period were we will see what teams can hack the busy schedule.