🇧🇪 Eden Hazard

[Blue Armour 4,439]

22 hours ago, BlueLyon said:

i completely agree, but on another note yesteday he was very good IMO.

Yeah he isnt leader or he isnt the one to be the most calm and make shit happen on his own, ie score goal etc. but when it comes to simply playing and helping the team, he is amazing. He is pulling the passes and dribbles, playmakes whole game. But for next step, he will simply need something better than Alonso or Cesc or Giroud.

Hazard is someone who needs one-twos with others and he needs the teammates around to get involved. He isnt direct player who will march on goal every time and pull something alone.

I hope he stays at Chelsea for long time, but if I drop the selfish act, I think the best for him would be to go to Barca. He and Messi plus all the other barca players, Im willing to bet he would leave the likes of Neymar and De Bruyne two levels below. Guidance of serial winners like Iniesta or Messi would help him improve infront of goal and quality of teammates in general would expand his play even further. His selfless play is absolutely perfect to feed the balls to Messi, Suarez and players like that would help himself feel less pressure and become more decisive infront of goal.

Compare Alonso, Cesc, Willian and Morata/Giroud with Alba, Iniesta, Suarez and Messi.

But the biggest problem is that people dont see what kind of Eden actualy is. Everyone wants goals and him being the main guy and make all the shit happen. Yeah its expected because he is the best player on the team, but thats not his style at all. Ribery or even Modric come to mind. Both are outstanding and arguably most important players for their teams at their peak. Sure Ronaldo is Ronaldo, but Modric was absolutely crucial in every single buildup of Real. Ask any fan, they will often tell you Modric was the motor and brain of that team. CR was scoring goals, and while goals are ''everything'', you still have to win midfield and create those goals, where Modric was unplayable. Ribery was similar, but he played from the wing. Both however had other, more direct players who then decided games and scored, like Ronaldo or Robben.

Eden is literaly the same. He makes everything tick, he goes deep to collect the ball, he passes around, dribbles, creates space. But we dont have the player that will actualy finish the chance off. Eden is the kind of player that picks the ball, goes toward the goal and then loves to release it. But we just dont have anyone near his quality. He makes a pass, then Willian fucks up a counter, Alonso isnt fast enough, Giroud misses the goal. The gulf between Eden and rest of the team in sheer quality is too big. Last year, Costa was on same level till january and we played outstanding football. Thats the difference if you have at least one more world class player in attack beside hazard.

 

Yep, Eden is the single most important player in this squad right now. You can always spend millions on 'potential' but you can never guarantee that you'll get quality like the stuff he produces for the team. People are always quick to blame everything on the first thing that comes to mind. The fact that Messi scored a couple of goals on counters is enough to mask all of Eden's contributions over the two legs.

[Magic Lamps 11,692]

Is it only me or has Eden tried to first-time back heel layoff at least once every game for weeks now?

 

Anyway this squad has many problems and Eden is not one of them. I think we should all accept by now that he is not gonna become a ballon d'or candidate or score 40 games per season. He just does not have this ambition or killer instinct and he does not want to have it. That is why I can see him staying over the summer. At Real the pressure would be much bigger to succeed Ronaldo and I can totally see him shying away from that.

 

However i think instead of demanding from Hazard to be that stand-out superstar he will never be the club should support him by signing quality players with technical ability to play around him. Like a striker who can actually score goals AND has good linkup play. or at least hast the potential to become that. Or more importantly a midfielder who can paly between the lines so hazard oes not need to pick up the ball deep every time himself. We do not need a superstar we need a well-balanced, technically and mentally strong squad no matter if hazard leaves or stays.

[Simon1991 233]

3 hours ago, Robguima said:

The obvious difference in quality you state IS priced in in their cost to the club: Hazard costs a lot more than the other players therefore the bar is/should be a lot higher for him.

What's your data to support that?

Last i know, Hazard's annual cost for the club is £13.3M.

Fabregas is higher for example, at £13.8M, Kante must be around £12M and Morata is around £19.5M (!).

I understand that you feel we can expect more from Hazard, based on the fact he is our best player, and i agree to some extent, but you cannot use his cost for the club to justify your point. Even with the outrageous wages rumoured with the new contract, he'd still end up costing the club roughly the same.

Cheers.

 

[Belgiannutt 3,201]

Saw this on another forum, pretty spot on imo.

 

"You won't be saying that if he leaves and we struggle to compete at all. Without him, we aren't getting close to that top 4. The one season he was off form for us, we finished 10th. I think a lot of people are undervaluing his importance to us right now. This isn't like a few years ago where we could afford to lose one of our top players. If Hazard goes, we are in trouble, i don't trust our board to find a good enough replacement. Even if they did identify a good enough replacement, i don't have faith in them getting that player to actually sign for us.

I find it baffling when people say things like "i won't care much if we sell Hazard", why would you not care? What do we get out of it if he leaves? All we end up with is a weaker squad and an almost toothless attack. I only ever hear people say they are okay with Hazard leaving when he doesn't turn up for the big games to get us a win (even though he has turned up for a lot of our biggest games since he arrived, especially in the league) Instead of pointing the finger at Hazard and demanding he step up and produce the goods, how about pointing the finger at the others, the ones that have rarely produced the goods in the big games? Or how about the board, the ones that have failed to get players that are capable of playing at the highest level with the likes of Hazard? (although it can be argued that they did, but we went and sold them all)

Out of all of the players we have had since the Roman era began, which ones have contributed more to our attack than Hazard? Drogba and Lampard, that's it. If Hazard was playing in the 2004-2010 Chelsea team, there would never be any complaints about him. Back then, we had other players that would stand out if one player wasn't producing the goods. If it wasn't Drogba, it was Lampard, if it wasn't Lampard, it was Terry, if it wasn't Terry it was, Gudjohnsen, Essien, Carvalho, Cole, Robben, Ivanovic. These days, if it isn't Hazard producing the goods in the big games, who else do we have that we can fall back on..........Willian on a good day maybe? that's about it. Back in 2004-2010, you would never hear about one player carrying the team, these days though, Hazard has carried this team more often than should ever be asked of a player.

Hazard stands out more because he's the only player in our squad that is expected to shine, in the past, when one of the other top players didn't step up, you could always count on another top player to step up in their place. If people don't think Hazard is a big game player, then maybe they should look up some videos of his goals, you will soon be reminded that he has scored a lot of important goals for us, more than anybody else since Drogba."

[robsblubot 3,595]

22 hours ago, Simon1991 said:

What's your data to support that?

Last i know, Hazard's annual cost for the club is £13.3M.

Fabregas is higher for example, at £13.8M, Kante must be around £12M and Morata is around £19.5M (!).

I understand that you feel we can expect more from Hazard, based on the fact he is our best player, and i agree to some extent, but you cannot use his cost for the club to justify your point. Even with the outrageous wages rumoured with the new contract, he'd still end up costing the club roughly the same.

Cheers.

 

As much data as everyone who says he will flourish in a bigger club.

but point well taken. I do believe that he enjoys a free role and there is some responsibility in that. Isn’t he under the highest wages (entire contract) at the club? Well he is going to be if he signs.

sorry I just don’t care about hazard one bit.. Much less for folks who are hazard fans first. Hyperbole to make a statement.

 

[Jase 43,479]

2 hours ago, Belgiannutt said:

"You won't be saying that if he leaves and we struggle to compete at all. Without him, we aren't getting close to that top 4. The one season he was off form for us, we finished 10th. I think a lot of people are undervaluing his importance to us right now. This isn't like a few years ago where we could afford to lose one of our top players. If Hazard goes, we are in trouble, i don't trust our board to find a good enough replacement. Even if they did identify a good enough replacement, i don't have faith in them getting that player to actually sign for us.

Pardon me if I'm nitpicking here but we did not finish 10th in 2015/16 because Hazard was off form. We finished 10th because the entire team switched off and there were problems off the pitch between the manager & players and manager & the board. If we use that person's logic, guess Hazard should be the one to blame if we don't finish in the top 4 this season since he hasn't been off form? 

On the bigger point, yes, we will miss Hazard's quality if/when he leaves but as cliche as this is, great players come and go at the club. If Hazard is the next one, then so be it. Won't be the first and definitely won't be the last. Do I have faith in the board to find the right quality player to replace him? No, I don't but if it means we have to suffer a few lean years and somehow hope the board come to their senses before getting back to the top, then so be it. 

[Belgiannutt 3,201]

29 minutes ago, Jason said:

Pardon me if I'm nitpicking here but we did not finish 10th in 2015/16 because Hazard was off form. We finished 10th because the entire team switched off and there were problems off the pitch between the manager & players and manager & the board. If we use that person's logic, guess Hazard should be the one to blame if we don't finish in the top 4 this season since he hasn't been off form? 

On the bigger point, yes, we will miss Hazard's quality if/when he leaves but as cliche as this is, great players come and go at the club. If Hazard is the next one, then so be it. Won't be the first and definitely won't be the last. Do I have faith in the board to find the right quality player to replace him? No, I don't but if it means we have to suffer a few lean years and somehow hope the board come to their senses before getting back to the top, then so be it. 

Think you're nitpicking. Can't speak for the person that wrote the message but i just think he meant that Hazard not being in form that season had a significant effect on the team.

Even if Hazard isn't in top form he still has a positive effect on the team that would be missed if he wasn't here anymore. 

and i agree with what he said that some people are underrating his importance to us.

 

The thing that worries me is that we've been slipping further and further down over the years. Yes we've won the title twice in the last 4 years but it just feels like we've taken 1 step forward only to go 2 steps back. 

Now this season even with Hazard we're struggling to make top four. The quality of the squad is just so poor. 

You talk about  a few lean years i worry that this could be the start of a lean decade. Both Manchester clubs will keep spending big so winning the title will be near impossible.

Unless Abramovich starts spending again i just don't see how we're gonna compete again. 

[Jase 43,479]

3 minutes ago, Belgiannutt said:

Think you're nitpicking. Can't speak for the person that wrote the message but i just think he meant that Hazard not being in form that season had a significant effect on the team.

Sorry but that's just piss poor of an excuse. Yes, the team have tended to do well when Hazard's on form but to have such significant impact on the team like in 2015/16 when he's not on form? Not buying it. There were other number of factors that led to our demise that season.

[Belgiannutt 3,201]

Just now, Jason said:

Sorry but that's just piss poor of an excuse. Yes, the team have tended to do well when Hazard's on form but to have such significant impact on the team like in 2015/16 when he's not on form? Not buying it. There were other number of factors that led to our demise that season.

??? Not saying that was the only reason for our poor form. There were multiple reasons Mourinho imploding was a big one but having Hazard in form would helped. Just look at the effect he had when he came back in form  at the end of that season.

[cfcs most wanted 657]

I think with Hazard the case is more with his thinking rather than his abilities, for me he is the best dribbler in the world with no exceptions, yet he doesn't often put it good use, even while Willian has largely limited ability in dribbling as compared to Hazard, whenever he gets the ball, he tries to run at defenders with it, trying to make chances, with Hazard the case seems more of making the passing look beautiful rather than of any good value. I know Hazard is the last of our problems, just something I think he should work on

[kellzfresh 7,229]

At least one thing is for sure, he's not getting his dream move to Madrid, not when they're looking for a goalscorer when he's not. 

[Jase 43,479]

9 minutes ago, kellzfresh said:

At least one thing is for sure, he's not getting his dream move to Madrid, not when they're looking for a goalscorer when he's not. 

We need to start counting the number of (pointless) backheels he does in each game...

[Fernando 6,585]

I think he is in the class of Ribery and Robben. 

If he stays we can win one CL with him ala Robben. After many tries. 

Hopefully he stays, because at Real he will get lost. 

[DDA 9,938]

On 3/17/2018 at 2:48 PM, cfcs most wanted said:

for me he is the best dribbler in the world

Better than Bakayoko? Behave yourself!

[Alabama 1,992]

With this level of performance...Madrid will never pay big money to sign him... Never not when the likes of Salah Kane Neymar are scoring goals for fun... 

[Special Juan 28,141]

On 3/17/2018 at 2:48 PM, cfcs most wanted said:

 for me he is the best dribbler in the world

Should see me on a Saturday night about 11PM

[the wes 7,212]

10 minutes ago, Mana said:

Maybe he's trying to lower his value for Madrid by playing shite.

 

Or If he has a good world cup his value could shoot through the roof 😃

[Jase 43,479]

 

[the wes 7,212]

5 minutes ago, Jason said:

 

What is it with Belgium players on international duty they love to talk to the Belgium media about their clubs 

[Blue Armour 4,439]

1 hour ago, the wes said:

What is it with Belgium players on international duty they love to talk to the Belgium media about their clubs 

Well he can't ignore a question when asked right? There is a thing such as media relations..I think its just his polite way of saying that its not the right time to discuss. After all, its a two-way street...the contract renewal is not up to Hazard alone.