Fernando Torres

[didierforever 7,349]

Well we're not going to get to any rational conclusion with exaggerations like he looses the ball 50% of the time he gets it. Here's a comparison from this season: Torres had 16 successful passes in 70 mins against Hull as opposed to only 8 passes in 65 mins by Ba. Torres seems to understand our AMs better and for me links up with them much better Lukaku who likes to play while facing the goal and Ba who usually takes up the space that the AMs like to run into.

Movement is not only on the ball, but off it as well. Torres makes runs to the wings and into the whole and exchanges positions with the three players behind him which creates spaces and shooting opportunities. Yes, Torres creates more space than Ba and Lukaku.

I'm not concerned with individual events. Like I said, he's far from world-class, and similarly you could find more than a hundred times when Lukaku should have passed but instead insisted on dribbling and lost possession.

That's your opinion that Lukaku is a better striker atm, but I disagree. I think he can be a super sub but still needs a lot to be a starter. I explained why here: http://forum.talkchelsea.net/topic/16615-player-focus-romelu-lukaku/

lets not include ba in our discussion. he is a goner. no point in including him just to make torres' stats look good.

sturridge's movement was off the ball, not on it, and that was what i was talking about. torres has 0 movement and even if he makes space for our mids, he does not make any space for himself to score. lukaku on the other hand gives us a far more direct approach. instead of playing on the wings, he likes to stay central, play on the cbs shoulders and run the channels. that way lukaku proves to be far more of a goal threat than torres does and that is what we want from our strikers.

its not jut that one individual event. tell me the no. of times torres was dispossessed in the united game. its not a one-off.

u just said that @las7 's stats are useless because they are not of lukaku playing for chelsea and yet the whole of your articles seems to be based on his time in wba. i am sorry but u cant have it both ways.

i am baising my opinion on what i have seen in 7 pre-season matches and 3 PL matches.

so i simply cant find a good reason to accept torres as chelsea's best striker at the moment.

[CHOULO19 24,332]

lets not include ba in our discussion. he is a goner. no point in including him just to make torres' stats look good.

sturridge's movement was off the ball, not on it, and that was what i was talking about. torres has 0 movement and even if he makes space for our mids, he does not make any space for himself to score. lukaku on the other hand gives us a far more direct approach. instead of playing on the wings, he likes to stay central, play on the cbs shoulders and run the channels. that way lukaku proves to be far more of a goal threat than torres does and that is what we want from our strikers.

its not jut that one individual event. tell me the no. of times torres was dispossessed in the united game. its not a one-off.

u just said that @las7 's stats are useless because they are not of lukaku playing for chelsea and yet the whole of your articles seems to be based on his time in wba. i am sorry but u cant have it both ways.

i am baising my opinion on what i have seen in 7 pre-season matches and 3 PL matches.

so i simply cant find a good reason to accept torres as chelsea's best striker at the moment.

Yes, I'm not disagreeing that Lukaku makes more space for himself than Torres, but it just so happens that we, as a team, play much better when space is made for the AMs and not the striker because our whole system is built around the AMs not the striker.

I'm not saying he doesn't get dispossessed often. But so do Lukaku and Torres. I used Lukaku's stats at WBA because those are the only ones available, but at the same time I highlighted how we play different styles and how his attributes would not work here as well as they did at WBA.

[didierforever 7,349]

Yes, I'm not disagreeing that Lukaku makes more space for himself than Torres, but it just so happens that we, as a team, play much better when space is made for the AMs and not the striker because our whole system is built around the AMs not the striker.

I'm not saying he doesn't get dispossessed often. But so do Lukaku and Torres. I used Lukaku's stats at WBA because those are the only ones available, but at the same time I highlighted how we play different styles and how his attributes would not work here as well as they did at WBA.

the villa game is the perfect example. teams will try to close our 3 AM's down. every1 knows, that they are our strength and our X-factor. and hence we need an outlet for those guys. not another person who adds to the congestion. believe it or not i felt we played the villa game more as 4-1-4-1 with rambo as our holding, lamps, bombarding forward. their was no natural width to our play as mata and hazard both kept coming in. ba simply could not provide as an outlet. somthing which happened many times with torres last season, albeit for different reasons.

our whole system is built around the AMs and not the striker - 100% AGREED. but those AM's are going to be less ineffective with a striker giving them the chance to put in the end ball. that is the reason we wanted falcao, cavani. torres simply cant do that. lukaku is going to be more effective.

[CHOULO19 24,332]

the villa game is the perfect example. teams will try to close our 3 AM's down. every1 knows, that they are our strength and our X-factor. and hence we need an outlet for those guys. not another person who adds to the congestion. believe it or not i felt we played the villa game more as 4-1-4-1 with rambo as our holding, lamps, bombarding forward. their was no natural width to our play as mata and hazard both kept coming in. ba simply could not provide as an outlet. somthing which happened many times with torres last season, albeit for different reasons.

our whole system is built around the AMs and not the striker - 100% AGREED. but those AM's are going to be less ineffective with a striker giving them the chance to put in the end ball. that is the reason we wanted falcao, cavani. torres simply cant do that. lukaku is going to be more effective.

I do agree that Lukaku would have been better against Villa (in theory, because in practice I don't think it would have made any difference since none of the AMs were going wide but insisted on going through the center). But I also think that Lukaku would have been invisible against united (see our game against Madrid in preseason) and that Torres did much better than Lukaku would have done against Hull. All in all, I think most of the time, it would be better to start Torres and bring Lukaku on as a sub.

[didierforever 7,349]

I do agree that Lukaku would have been better against Villa (in theory, because in practice I don't think it would have made any difference since none of the AMs were going wide but insisted on going through the center). But I also think that Lukaku would have been invisible against united (see our game against Madrid in preseason) and that Torres did much better than Lukaku would have done against Hull. All in all, I think most of the time, it would be better to start Torres and bring Lukaku on as a sub.

in all honesty, i think lukaku would have cracked a couple of goals. and how are you saying torres did much better than lukaku would have done against hull is beyond me. all torres actually did was one good pass to oscar. the penalty which torres got was well foolish from th keeper and you have to admit these kind of balls are lukaku's prowess. the fk that he earned was a dive and 35 yards out. i seriously doubt that such a thing should even be mentioned while putting on the credentials of a player but that is what torres makes u do. except for these 3 events , i dont remember anythign. his general play was bad as usual and the reception he got here after the match would prove me right.

he dint get into a singl goal scoring position/oppurtunity.

he created 1 goal scoring opp (penalty), and none from open play which is not something u would generally expect from a striker who is playing in the team due to his link up play.

[Mouri_Matic 560]

in all honesty, i think lukaku would have cracked a couple of goals. and how are you saying torres did much better than lukaku would have done against hull is beyond me. all torres actually did was one good pass to oscar. the penalty which torres got was well foolish from th keeper and you have to admit these kind of balls are lukaku's prowess. the fk that he earned was a dive and 35 yards out. i seriously doubt that such a thing should even be mentioned while putting on the credentials of a player but that is what torres makes u do. except for these 3 events (2 of which would normally not even be worth mentioning), i dont remember anythign.

Don't try it, wait until they bring up ''that corner in Munich'' as an assist from Torres.

[Parky 739]

Torres our best striker?

Bwahaha...

[CHOULO19 24,332]

in all honesty, i think lukaku would have cracked a couple of goals. and how are you saying torres did much better than lukaku would have done against hull is beyond me. all torres actually did was one good pass to oscar. the penalty which torres got was well foolish from th keeper and you have to admit these kind of balls are lukaku's prowess. the fk that he earned was a dive and 35 yards out. i seriously doubt that such a thing should even be mentioned while putting on the credentials of a player but that is what torres makes u do. except for these 3 events , i dont remember anythign. his general play was bad as usual and the reception he got here after the match would prove me right.

he dint get into a singl goal scoring position/oppurtunity.

he created 1 goal scoring opp (penalty), and none from open play which is not something u would generally expect from a striker who is playing in the team due to his link up play.

Yes he did not create much chances through passes but he did create A LOT of space with his movement. KDB, Oscar and Hazard always found space to run into centrally and that is because Torres made countless runs to the wings and dropped into the whole and allowed one of the three to run beyond him into the vacant space. For me, the first half against Hull is exactly why he is currently our best striker and why he fits better into the team than the others.

[didierforever 7,349]

Yes he did not create much chances through passes but he did create A LOT of space with his movement. KDB, Oscar and Hazard always found space to run into centrally and that is because Torres made countless runs to the wings and dropped into the whole and allowed one of the three to run beyond him into the vacant space. For me, the first half against Hull is exactly why he is currently our best striker and why he fits better into the team than the others.

same thing again. as i said before, not what we want.

[YouNameIt 1,511]

Yes he did not create much chances through passes but he did create A LOT of space with his movement. KDB, Oscar and Hazard always found space to run into centrally and that is because Torres made countless runs to the wings and dropped into the whole and allowed one of the three to run beyond him into the vacant space. For me, the first half against Hull is exactly why he is currently our best striker and why he fits better into the team than the others.

Sorry but I have to ask: Did you hit your head?

I will save this post, and then re-post it after you've seen enough of Lukaku. Then you should feel quite dumb.

[Tomo 21,681]

I've said over a month ago and I'll say it again: The sooner you accept that Torres is our first choice striker the more moaning and cry you save yourselves.

Yes, he's no where near a world-class striker, but at the moment he's our best striker. Accept it, embrace it, learn to live with it.

You were saying?

[Fernando 6,375]

Excited that now with Eto and Lukaku, Torres will have limited time.

He can even get discourage and put in a transfer request!

[Tomo 21,681]

Im guessing he has gone back to not caring about results

[CHOULO19 24,332]

You were saying?

I hope Eto'o can perform to something near his previous best, but I think that would be a bot too much to ask of someone has been away from football at the top level for almost three seasons.

[Tomo 21,681]

I hope Eto'o can perform to something near his previous best, but I think that would be a bot too much to ask of someone has been away from football at the top level for almost three seasons.

The Russian league isn't as bad as made out, they have the Moscow teams and Zenit who are strong, certainly not that much weaker then the french league (for example).

We don't even need him at his previous best, with the midfield we have a striker who knows what he is doing should be fine.

[CHOULO19 24,332]

The Russian league isn't as bad as made out, they have the Moscow teams and Zenit who are strong, certainly not that much weaker then the french league (for example).

We don't even need him at his previous best, with the midfield we have a striker who knows what he is doing should be fine.

Maybe, but it's no where near the level of the CL. Anyway, he'll need time to blend in with the players.

[Blue Armour 4,158]

I was one of the very few people criticizing Torres when people were making ridiculous excuses like Malouda hates him and Kalou doesn't pass to him and our midfield is too slow for him and that it's just a matter of time till he gets back to his best. He never got back to his best and he never will. But he has improved and adjusted to our system. But now instead of the ridiculous excuses the new trend seems to be ridiculous hate towards him despite us not having any better options. It seems this man can only inspire extreme opinions.

Same here..remember back when AVB was here, other strikers like Didier were getting so much flak. People's opinions can get turned on their heads so quickly when something new comes along. Torres has made an effort to change his game for the way the current team is setup. Granted, its not very good, but then again he isn't the type of striker meant for this role. So criticizing him at this point is rather hollow.

Nonetheless I would definitely like to see Lukaku get a chance to start, especially in one of the coming games against Everton and Fulham. Just so he can get a fair chance, and doesn't go down the Daniel Sturridge route.

[yuvala 2,167]

If I were him I'd leave. Eto'o coming in now to be Jose's number one, and Lukaku is our man for the future,

Pretty sure he isn't happy with how he's playing, he's staying for the trophies probably, but what's the point when you play bad? I mean doesn't he want to go to Spain or something and do better?