The Conte Thread

[El P. 1,354]

You're right about the need to replace the bad players with good ones and have a different approach with transfers but at the same time, I do not want us to keep the manager for the sake of keeping it. As Tomo alluded to above, had Conte been trying to get his best out of the squad but still came up short, then yes, I wouldn't mind us keeping him at all. But he has been sabotaging the team's attempt at success this season, especially in 2018. We all can agree that this squad isn't good enough to challenge at the highest level at the moment but it's still good enough to finish in the top 4. But Conte went AWOL and decided it's better to prove a point to the board by making hopeless team selections, tactical decisions etc.

Sabotaging? On purpose? I guess you have some insider info that I'm not aware of...

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[Special Juan 27,104]

MP saying he is speaking with Spurs about his future plans and what they need to take themselves forward.....Well he will be no fucking good here will he?

[Supermonkey92 1,428]

If the board don' change with some more knowledgeable directors we will not be an attractive prospect soon. All takes is 2-3 poor seasons in a row. 

[Jase 43,479]

23 hours ago, OneMoSalah said:

Not sure. I thought Conte and Emenalo were butting heads over transfers and taking the club in whatever direction. Emenalo did sign some absolute shite players this summer though, Drinkwater, Bakayoko, Zappacosta.. a lack of quality didnt help. 

At this point, it's tough to take Conte's words seriously anymore. Anything that comes out from him these days feels more like excuses than anything else. 

[El P. 1,354]

Hazard now moaning about transfers too. Damn it, it must be this Conte's influence... Don't know what else could it be!

How did they not learn just to suck it up and shut up and do their jobs. I mean, are we paying them so much so they can have their opinions and freedom of speech? Gosh, world gone mad...

[pHaRaOn 2,131]

9 hours ago, Jason said:

At this point, it's tough to take Conte's words seriously anymore. Anything that comes out from him these days feels more like excuses than anything else. 

Conte has praised Emenalo before:

"My relationship with Michael was very good as he helped me a lot last season"
http://www.chelseafc.com/news/latest-news/2017/11/five-at-5pm0.html

Back then it was also reported that Emenalo was Conte' close ally
https://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/premier-league/chelsea-news-michael-emenalo-leaves-robs-antonio-conte-close-ally-peacemaker-maria-granovskaia-a8041481.html

 

[BlueLyon 9,359]

2 hours ago, El P. said:

Hazard now moaning about transfers too. Damn it, it must be this Conte's influence... Don't know what else could it be!

How did they not learn just to suck it up and shut up and do their jobs. I mean, are we paying them so much so they can have their opinions and freedom of speech? Gosh, world gone mad...

We are apparently a big club and if we were ambitious, there would be no need for them to speak about the issue.

Between you and me, you probably agree we need better players and more ambition too. 

I see bigger problem in players not performing or flirting with other clubs  rather talk about us needing better transfers. In other words, its at least intent they do give a shit about club and want to succeed here. Heck Griezmann said the same thing about Atletico signings and showing ambition.

[BlueLyon 9,359]

On 5/14/2018 at 6:27 PM, OneMoSalah said:

Not sure. I thought Conte and Emenalo were butting heads over transfers and taking the club in whatever direction. Emenalo did sign some absolute shite players this summer though, Drinkwater, Bakayoko, Zappacosta.. a lack of quality didnt help. 

Lets see what we do in summer without Emenalo. 

IMO Emenalo was never the problem, problem was not having someone with actual quality and experience in charge. Its not like there was someone realy talented under shadow of Emenalo and Emenalo leaving will give that man open arms.

Now, there is no Emenalo anymore, but we didnt get anyone like Kenyon, not sure we will do any better with Marina.

There were rumours about getting Lille director, but I hope thats not true. The man ordered (together with Bielsa) to get rid of every experienced player, which pushed Lille young inexperienced team (they have youngest team in europe) on brink of league 2. Not to mention they are being sued by Bielsa and french football federation reported Lille has empty bank and if they wont pay debts until july 1st, they will go straight to league 2 (they spent over 60m last summer). Talk about bad management.

[Jase 43,479]

3 hours ago, pHaRaOn said:

Conte has praised Emenalo before:

"My relationship with Michael was very good as he helped me a lot last season"
http://www.chelseafc.com/news/latest-news/2017/11/five-at-5pm0.html

Back then it was also reported that Emenalo was Conte' close ally
https://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/premier-league/chelsea-news-michael-emenalo-leaves-robs-antonio-conte-close-ally-peacemaker-maria-granovskaia-a8041481.html

 

I don't necessarily mean he's lying about his relationship with Emenalo but more of the fact that he's just gonna say whatever convenient to absolve himself of any blame for this season's failure. 

[Unionjack 7,531]

On 14/05/2018 at 9:57 PM, oldportblue said:

Getting a manager that won't whine *every* press conference about the team not being good enough to compete will also help. The players heard it so often that I truly believe it had an averse effect on them and the chase for top 4 (we were clearly good enough to get top 4 and a more positive manager, in terms of tactics and overall demeanor, probably would've gotten it fairly easily this season).

When Conte comes out stating we need to do more in the transfer marker he is whining and it had an averse effect on the team but when Eden comes out stating basically hes gonna fuck off if je doesn't have better players around him hes done the right thing  and peeps dont blame him.

Amazing.

 

13 hours ago, Jason said:

At this point, it's tough to take Conte's words seriously anymore. Anything that comes out from him these days feels more like excuses than anything else. 

Am I in some sort of Groundhog Day dream? What other manager does this remind you of?

[11Drogba 2,000]

1 hour ago, Unionjack said:

When Conte comes out stating we need to do more in the transfer marker he is whining and it had an averse effect on the team but when Eden comes out stating basically hes gonna fuck off if je doesn't have better players around him hes done the right thing  and peeps dont blame him.

Amazing.

If Hazard said this before and after the games almost every week I am sure he would be criticized too.

Also Conte  may not be getting his first targets but he is obviously involved in the process. So he is partly responsible unlike Hazard.

[Unionjack 7,531]

2 minutes ago, 11Drogba said:

If Hazard said this before and after the games almost every week I am sure he would be criticized too.

Also Conte  may not be getting his first targets but he is obviously involved in the process. So he is partly responsible unlike Hazard.

But we have mo idea WHAT the process is. Hes said many times he only gives his opinions WHEN hes asked for them.

And if he was the only one of our managers to have had this problem I;d be all over him too. But we have got a bad record of it.

I remember the 2nd time Mou came and a report about his contract stating he wouldn't have anything to do with players coming or going.

This just has to be one of our prioritis that needs sorting.

I'm wondering if our next manager will contact any of our old ones for ideas on how the board operates. Or has a solicitor to go tru his contract?

I know if I was coming for an interview and seen the headlines, heard the gossip etc I sure would be on the phone to Conte/Mou asking them what went wrong/ Its enough to put any good manager off.

Unless they were vain or cocky enough to think it would be different foe them!

[Adnane 1,101]

1 hour ago, Mana said:

If Conte goes, then we should get rid of the players who are in to player power.

If we compare the 2015 squad with the 2017 squad, here are the usual suspects:

- Hazard
- Willian
- Cahill
- Courtois
- Fabregas

I left out two players - Pedro (Just came in 2015) and Azpi (Has performed well both seasons).

Yes, the Hazard Brigade will raise their pitchforks, but no fucking player is bigger than the club. 

 

That's amazing, we have only kept 5 players in the first team ( active one obviously not the likes of Christensen ) in the last 3 years, considering that in 2015 we had normally assembled a core of players post 2012 transition ready to go for years to come...

There might be a resemblance of lack of consistency then, we formed a strong core for almost 10 years before but we are struggling to have consistent results now because of that same reason.

Let's look at teams like Juve, Bayern or Real Madrid who are for me the most successful ones in the last 5-6 years ( excluding Barcelona because they have an outlier ), the catch is that despite a comparable coach rotation to us ( except maybe Juve ), these teams are keeping their world class players put for a lot of years, hence why any new manager only needs to focus about the winning part. This is a reliable model because it means that your success becomes independent from your manager, and that the players make the team. 

On the other hand, both our board hasn't been consistent enough with their recruitments/sales and these players themselves haven't been performing consistently.

The interesting part is that the massive wave of recruitment in 2012 - 2014 was for this sole purpose, forming a core with the following players : Courtois, Hazard, Willian, Salah Shuerrle, Matic, Fabregas, Costa, Oscar, De Bruyne, Azpilicueta, Zouma, Filipe Luis, etc. We have just tremendously failed at assembling this talent in a consistent time span for the good benefit of the club.

And a reason of that might be our board actually bending too much for managers, the reasons we shipped out talents like Filipe, Salah, and KDB is Mourinho, some players were just not suiting the philosophy of Conte ( Zouma, Oscar... ) and we now find ourselves with a very weak core of players...

All that being said, we are building one now with the additions of Christensen, Kanté, Morata, Bakayoko etc. But if we are to get anything from these guys then consistency should be there, not only from a coaching standpoint ( I have no issues with changing coaches as it provides a different dynamic and room for improvement to the team ) but also in how we handle our transfers. 

Simply put, if players like Morata and Bakayoko are in demand tomorrow we should be saying no and keeping them, if we believed enough in them in the 1st place to invest such a hefty amount of money then we should be equally believing in them and keeping them on the long run ( and I genuinely believe they are indeed good players ). 

[Tomo 21,681]

1 hour ago, Mana said:

If Conte goes, then we should get rid of the players who are in to player power.

If we compare the 2015 squad with the 2017 squad, here are the usual suspects:

- Hazard
- Willian
- Cahill
- Courtois
- Fabregas

I left out two players - Pedro (Just came in 2015) and Azpi (Has performed well both seasons).

Yes, the Hazard Brigade will raise their pitchforks, but no fucking player is bigger than the club. 

Out of interest, what has made you (or any one else who thinks it) come to the conclusion Hazard has an uncontrollable ego and bad attitude? 

[Tomo 21,681]

16 minutes ago, Mana said:

He doesn't have to have an uncontrollable ego or a bad attitude. He can just not be bothered to play on the pitch (like he has a huge number of times in the past 3 years). That's still player power.

That's not true either. People seem to think him not being at his best equals can't be bothered.

[Tomo 21,681]

11 minutes ago, Mana said:

I've seen a handful of games that he doesn't look bothered. I'm not saying every game he's not at his best = not bothered, but there were actual games that he was invisible/did hardly anything.

He took some lessons from Willian.

You could say that with any player. I could probably even cherry pick moments were Kante didn't "look" bothered if i try hard enough, doesn't make it true.

The reality is in such a high level of sport, if Eden was turning it off and on as he pleased he wouldn't be a quarter as good as he is, it's impossible to do such a thing while maintaining a world class level. If Hazard had that type of attitude he would have gone down the route of the likes of Taarabt, Nani, Ravel Morrison, Quaresma and be anywhere from Turkey to Mexico by now.

[Cosmin 2,484]

43 minutes ago, Tomo said:

Out of interest, what has made you (or any one else who thinks it) come to the conclusion Hazard has an uncontrollable ego and bad attitude? 

Well, his actual attitude someone speaks volumes. He looks lazy and like he doesn't give a crap.

Also, his statements lately don't do him any justice either on that aspect.

[akgw13 867]

I definitely have had my issues with Hazard and his attitude but I think we also discount just how heavily we rely on him. Most games if he isnt absolutely humming our attack is useless. That weighs on a player, he is allowed bad games. It just so happens that when he has bad games our attack grounds to a halt. I am curious to see him play under an offensive minded coach with a potential new signing or two and a more transitional midfield. 

He is so isolated in the 352 system with Giroud/Fabregas/Bakayoko combo it must be so frustrating.