BlueLion. 21,491 Posted January 11, 2015 Share Posted January 11, 2015 Thibaut Courtois has a broken thumb, according to Chelsea assistant manager Steve Holland.Holland, standing in for José Mourinho for the Blues' obligated pre- and post-match press conferences, announced that the Belgian broke the thumb on his left hand during Chelsea's defeat at White Hart Lane on New Year's Day. Confirming that the injury was not terminal, Holland explained that the decision to retain fans' favourite Petr Cech in goal was so that Courtois' ailment would not be risked."It was something that Thibaut picked up in the game against Tottenham", he said. "If it had been vital to play he could but when we had Petr Cech as a replacement it was a no-brainer". Cech, who now has 225 clean sheets for the club, made his tenth appearance of a frustrating season when he took to the field against Newcastle on Saturday, where he made one particularly fine save to deny Remy Cabella from giving the visitors a lead their play deserved in the first half. Instead, the Czech's intervention proved the foundation from which the Blues went on to cruise home to a comfortable 2-0 victory. After also playing - and keeping another shut-out - in last weekend's FA Cup win over Watford, Cech's fifth clean sheet in just nine starts this season means he has an incredible concession rate of one goal every 183.6 minutes this term - compared to Courtois' rate of a goal conceded every 95.5 minutes. "Obviously the clean sheet makes it even better but the most important is the three points because after the defeat at Tottenham, we wanted to bounce back in the league", said Cech after the game. "We had to really dig deep and in the second half we improved. Obviously the first goal helped us get over a difficult moment. In the second half we improved and then we had the chances to score more goals". Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
boshman 1,073 Posted January 11, 2015 Share Posted January 11, 2015 Can't be that broken if he was named on the bench. What if Pete injured himself? We replace him with an injured goalkeeper? Don't think so myself. I think he was dropped after the shambles that was Spurs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BlueLion. 21,491 Posted January 11, 2015 Author Share Posted January 11, 2015 Can't be that broken if he was named on the bench. What if Pete injured himself? We replace him with an injured goalkeeper? Don't think so myself. I think he was dropped after the shambles that was Spurs.Agreed, can't be that serious, but it is increasingly easy for goalkeepers to play with broken digits (trust me, I'm talking from experience).Neuer had these SMUs made up in 2013 so he could play with a broken finger:It's a risk, but if necessary then you can play with a broken finger. It obviously isn't a bad break or he'd have been subbed off at Spurs and wouldn't have been on the bench yesterday. But why risk him when you have a quality GK on the bench? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RoyalBlues 4,050 Posted January 11, 2015 Share Posted January 11, 2015 has Blackman back? that will answer the question, why Courtois on the bench. I have checked at Boro website, no news about Blackman and still on their squad list. My thought is that Blackman is not back yet, and Courtois 'forced' to be on the bench, and still could forced to play if necessary. Might still have a pain a little. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BlueLion. 21,491 Posted January 11, 2015 Author Share Posted January 11, 2015 has Blackman back? that will answer the question, why Courtois on the bench. I have checked at Boro website, no news about Blackman and still on their squad list. My thought is that Blackman is not back yet, and Courtois 'forced' to be on the bench, and still could forced to play if necessary. Might still have a pain a little.Yup: http://www.gazettelive.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/jamal-blackman-returns-chelsea-having-8382609Blackman leaving is the reason why Kalas' loan to Boro was finalised. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RoyalBlues 4,050 Posted January 11, 2015 Share Posted January 11, 2015 Yup: http://www.gazettelive.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/jamal-blackman-returns-chelsea-having-8382609Blackman leaving is the reason why Kalas' loan to Boro was finalised.ah, I see. They really said on Kalas article on their website :Kalas, who joins fellow Chelsea loan men Patrick Bamford and Kenneth Omeruo, has been training with Aitor Karanka’s squad at Rockliffe Park and will be available for selection for Boro’s game against Reading at the Madejski Stadium on Saturday (3pm).it seems Blackman has back in the squad, but Boro admin seems very lazy to even update their squad list, lol. Courtois is fit enough to play then. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BlueLion. 21,491 Posted January 11, 2015 Author Share Posted January 11, 2015 ah, I see. They really said on Kalas article on their website :it seems Blackman has back in the squad, but Boro admin seems very lazy to even update their squad list, lol. Courtois is fit enough to play then.Spot on, if it was serious then Blackman would be on the bench. However why risk even a slight injury when you have a guy with 225 clean sheets for the club on the bench? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RoyalBlues 4,050 Posted January 11, 2015 Share Posted January 11, 2015 when you have a guy with 225 clean sheets for the club on the bench sorry, I just found it was funny to read, that is crazy number for a young GK Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MichaelDance 552 Posted January 11, 2015 Share Posted January 11, 2015 Aww Courtois hope you get better. As for the bench we only have 3 goalies haha, 1 playing, 1 who's hardly ever played for us, and 1 who is experienced so it's best to have courtois on the bench in case we really really really needed him. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CurlyHairLikeLuiz 1,625 Posted January 11, 2015 Share Posted January 11, 2015 I like Courtois but I did miss Cech. Also after his performance against Spurs he probably deserved to gt dropped anyway. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MichaelDance 552 Posted January 11, 2015 Share Posted January 11, 2015 I like Courtois but I did miss Cech. Also after his performance against Spurs he probably deserved to gt dropped anyway.Same Cech will always be our number 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CurlyHairLikeLuiz 1,625 Posted January 11, 2015 Share Posted January 11, 2015 Also, I've noticed Cech is picking out the ball a lot more now, more like Courtois, but I remember he used to much prefer punching the ball out of the zone. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
manpe 10,861 Posted January 11, 2015 Share Posted January 11, 2015 I like Courtois but I did miss Cech. Also after his performance against Spurs he probably deserved to gt dropped anyway.Refresh my memory were the goals Tibo's fault? I don't remember anymore. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CurlyHairLikeLuiz 1,625 Posted January 11, 2015 Share Posted January 11, 2015 Refresh my memory were the goals Tibo's fault? I don't remember anymore.A few were. Obviously not the penalty and I think the last one, but the rest certainly were, although his CBs didn't exactly help. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BlueLion. 21,491 Posted January 11, 2015 Author Share Posted January 11, 2015 I like Courtois but I did miss Cech. Also after his performance against Spurs he probably deserved to gt dropped anyway.I liked this only for the first sentence. I don't think you can attribute the blame to Courtois for any of Spurs' goals. Kane's goals were epic, Chadli's was an horrific deflection, the penalty was unstoppable and Rose's was down to sheer bad luck. I miss Cech playing, always will be my favourite Chelsea player and an inspiration. He's the reason I became a goalkeeper. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Weckerz 3,781 Posted January 11, 2015 Share Posted January 11, 2015 Refresh my memory were the goals Tibo's fault? I don't remember anymore.None of them were his fault.Then again Cech has been really good when he had to stand in this season so I wouldn't be surprised if he'll get his chance to get the record, and probably deservedly so. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BlueLion. 21,491 Posted January 11, 2015 Author Share Posted January 11, 2015 Would anyone begrudge Cech if was more or less rotated as number one with Thibaut between now and the end of the season?12 more appearances and he passes the 500 game mark. 7 more clean sheets in the PL and he's the top goalkeeper in the competition's history in every possible statistic. I can see him making those dozen appearances across all competitions (potentially 3 more League Cup games to play, could be a fair few FA Cup matches as well, and he's been our designated UCL keeper this season, so why not?) but the clean sheets record is just beyond him. His ratio is 0.49 clean sheets per game, so he'd need to play 15 more league games (in theory) to attain that record. Unless José is a canny sod and plays Cech against all the teams we're basically guaranteed clean sheets in Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BlueLion. 21,491 Posted January 11, 2015 Author Share Posted January 11, 2015 Why we need new thread of Tibo, when already we have one.This is called an article. If I posted this in the Courtois thread it wouldn't get the forum any hits, plus the article would have thousands of unrelated replies. And let's be fair, this is a discussion about Cech as much as Courtois. So should I post it in Cech's topic as well? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CurlyHairLikeLuiz 1,625 Posted January 11, 2015 Share Posted January 11, 2015 I liked this only for the first sentence. I don't think you can attribute the blame to Courtois for any of Spurs' goals. Kane's goals were epic, Chadli's was an horrific deflection, the penalty was unstoppable and Rose's was down to sheer bad luck. I miss Cech playing, always will be my favourite Chelsea player and an inspiration. He's the reason I became a goalkeeper. I liked this only for the first sentence. I don't think you can attribute the blame to Courtois for any of Spurs' goals. Kane's goals were epic, Chadli's was an horrific deflection, the penalty was unstoppable and Rose's was down to sheer bad luck. I miss Cech playing, always will be my favourite Chelsea player and an inspiration. He's the reason I became a goalkeeper. Yes, obviously it was also his back 4 too but it was obvious he wasn't up to his usual excellent standards.Agreed. Cech is such an inspiration, it's a shame it's almost certain he will leave in the summer I hope he returns to the club afterwards... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Strike 7,490 Posted January 12, 2015 Share Posted January 12, 2015 Cech should play the League Cup semifinals against Liverpool Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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