Chelsea 2-3 Real Madrid

[quickpassnmove 924]

2 hours ago, Chelsea Buzz said:

Ok, I hate to moan and complain about the media, but the Sky Sports Headline reads: Second Team Real Madrid beats Chelsea

Am I missing something or was the game not second team vs second team for the most part?

Both teams had a bit of a mix and were missing names like Ronaldo and Costa.

Last time I checked, these Chelsea starting XI are not first teamers: Begovic, Aina, Oscar, RLC, Traore. Nearly half the squad.

What gives?

Most of the Madrid side were NOT 1st team starters, full stop. 1st half RM had a team of only 1/2 1st team starters (some occasional) and the rest were backups, 2nd team youth players. 2nd half RM used 3rd tier youth players.

[OhForAGreavsie 5,776]

9 hours ago, Jason said:

1. Although we lost out narrowly in the end, it was still an embarrassing loss considering Real Madrid played their B/C/D team and only their second pre-season match.

2. We might have gotten new optimism from having brought in a new manager and 2 decent signings, it still can't hide the fact that we still have some rubbish players and a poor defence. We can buy all the best players there is in attack and midfield but if we don't sort that back 4 out, we won't get anywhere. It's almost a joke now that we're about to enter the 4th/5th season playing with the same back 4 that everyone can see there's obvious problems with it.

3. Conte is hell bent on playing the 4-2-4, isn't he? I'm all for new formation being played, even if I'm not liking this new one, but it's somewhat concerning that we haven't really tried out different formations so far.

4. Just as we are often told not to read too much into pre-season results and performances, can we even take positives from some of the players' display today? I mean, they played against a Real Madrid B/C/D side after all.

Hello Jay,

First of all, I think you are right to caution everybody not to get carried away simply because we have appointed a new manager and have shown promise against two very weak Austrian sides. On the other hand, I think you are being overly pessimistic here.

 I tend to agree with the points @Belgiannutt  made in his reply but I'd like to add something to what he said. It concerns your fourth point. I don't know how you would describe the lineups with which the two sides finished the game. C/D  for Real and A/B for Chelsea perhaps?

If that was so, what should we expect to happen in that situation? Surely we would think Chelsea would have much the better of the game. Well that is exactly what happened. We cut through them at will and if our finishing had been better we'd have won. This doesn't mean the players who were on the pitch at the time are world beaters but at least they lived up to expectations and that's a start.

We are not as good as Real, nor as good as we should be, but I'm confident that we are better than we looked yesterday. It's self evident that we can put  out a stronger 11 then we had on the pitch at any stage last night. That 11 would still loose to Madrid but only because they're a great team and we are not.

Our focus should be on whether or not we are better than we were, on the manager figuring out which players can help him, and which cannot, and on further successes in the transfer market.

[Belgiannutt 3,201]

Just rewatched the first half. Oscar and Matic are the main culprits for the goals.

1st goal Both of them are way too deep. Matic actually ends up stepping away from Marcelo and Oscar just flings a leg at Marcelo's shot.

2nd goal Oscar losing his man, Matic is too far away and doesn't get across quickly enough. (Cahill also anticipates (wrongly) that the players he's pressing is going to the outside instead he goes to the inside and passes to Marcelo who now has acres of space to run into)

3rd goal Again Matic doesn't get across quickly enough to press the player.

[Jase 43,479]

2 hours ago, Belgiannutt said:

1/ Think you're being a bit dramatic Jason. Looking at our starting lineup only Willian, Azpi and 1 of Cahill/Terry will be in the first 11.(if we sign a CB and a LB) That's 3 out of the 11 players.

Also think it's a bit much saying Real Madrid played their B team. Marcelo, Varane, Cavajal and Casemiro are all starters for Madrid. Both teams played a mixture in the first half. They simply have better depth then we do.

Don't think I was being dramatic. Regardless of who will eventually be in the starting XI, we still put out a strong team with plenty of experience - Cahill, Terry, Azpi, Willian, Matic, Oscar, Pedro, Begovic. That's certainly more than Real Madrid, who only had Marcelo and Varane as the first team starters. The rest are more of a backup. Of course, I'm not saying that just because we had the stronger team out there, we should have won but the least I expected was competency and not being 3-0 down at HT to a weakened Real Madrid side, who didn't even have one from Benzema, Bale, Ronaldo, Modric, Kroos, Rodriguez.

2 hours ago, Belgiannutt said:

We played our second pre- season game 2 days ago. Not like we're further ahead in our preparation.

The game yesterday was our 5th in pre season - we've played Rapid Vienna, RZ Pellets, an Austrian local side and Liverpool before Real Madrid.

3 hours ago, Belgiannutt said:

3/ I actually like the 4-2-4. It's just that our defense and midfield are being way too sloppy on the ball. Our front 4 simply aren't seeing enough of the ball.

There lies the problem isn't it? And it's not just being sloppy on the ball, it's the fact that we aren't good enough defensively to play an open/attack-minded system like the 4-2-4.

1 hour ago, OhForAGreavsie said:

First of all, I think you are right to caution everybody not to get carried away simply because we have appointed a new manager and have shown promise against two very weak Austrian sides. On the other hand, I think you are being overly pessimistic here.

Pessimistic? More like being realistic. We might have a new manager with new ideas and may have shown some promises in the friendlies so far but that still doesn't change the overall point that we have plenty of gaping holes that we still haven't addressed, especially defensively. It's like I said earlier, we won't get anywhere if we let in stupid goals like Marcelo's second or even his first.

[Jase 43,479]

7 hours ago, Chelsea Buzz said:

 I remember two, pretty meh in 4-0 romp over Aston Villa and then shaky vs Swansea.

I am certain if he was better or even close, Conte would get him the game considering our crappy back line.

 

Thought he was decent against Villa, considering it was his debut, but then again, it was Villa. Or maybe Conte is another stubborn manager?

[Belgiannutt 3,201]

3 minutes ago, Jason said:

Don't think I was being dramatic. Regardless of who will eventually be in the starting XI, we still put out a strong team with plenty of experience - Cahill, Terry, Azpi, Willian, Matic, Oscar, Pedro, Begovic. That's certainly more than Real Madrid, who only had Marcelo and Varane as the first team starters. The rest are more of a backup. Of course, I'm not saying that just because we had the stronger team out there, we should have won but the least I expected was competency and not being 3-0 down at HT to a weakened Real Madrid side, who didn't even have one from Benzema, Bale, Ronaldo, Modric, Kroos, Rodriguez.

The game yesterday was our 5th in pre season - we've played Rapid Vienna, RZ Pellets, an Austrian local side and Liverpool before Real Madrid.

There lies the problem isn't it? And it's not just being sloppy on the ball, it's the fact that we aren't good enough defensively to play an open/attack-minded system like the 4-2-4.

 

Experience yes but there's a reason why the majority of those players you named aren't gonna be starting for us. They're simply not good enough.

I understand that you wanted and expected a better performance from them we all did but let's face it Madrid have more quality in their first team and have better depth then us. This match was always going to be an up hill battle for us.

My bad about the number of preseason games but even if we played more games Madrid and us still started preseason at the same time so i don't think we really had an advantage over Madrid.

Like i said we need to get a FB and a CB. With the defenders we have now every system that isn't parking the bus would struggle.

There really is no way around the fact we need to strenghten at the back.

[OhForAGreavsie 5,776]

1 hour ago, Jason said:

Pessimistic? More like being realistic. We might have a new manager with new ideas and may have shown some promises in the friendlies so far but that still doesn't change the overall point that we have plenty of gaping holes that we still haven't addressed, especially defensively. It's like I said earlier, we won't get anywhere if we let in stupid goals like Marcelo's second or even his first.

I don't disagree with any of this. I don't think anyone could. The point is that none of it is news.

We already knew that we are in a tough spot, that we lack both breadth and depth of quality, and that unlike Jose the new manager is not a magic wand. He isn't going to win the league with this shower.

What we might have hoped to gain from yesterday was information about how the quest for solutions is going. It is in the way you have assessed  that quest that I think your response is pessimistic. 

Only two players have arrived so far to help strengthen the squad. Neither of them started.

Far from being strengthened, the back four has in fact been weakened. Their frailties were visible but they were by no means as bad as they have been characterised. Take any back four, put them behind a better front six and their defending will immediately improve. We need to distinguish  between a team's defenders and its defence. Last night our defenders started the game behind a horrible front six and as a result our deence was worse than it might have been.  Look for example at the way Nemanja's inability to play a simple pass with his right foot caused him to play a less sound one with his left, that led eventually to Ola being dispossessed and the second goal being conceded.

On the other hand Bats was okay when he came on, Hazard was okay when he came on, and Nate continued his better-than-expected form.

I felt there was evidence that once Antonio decides to put his top 11 onto the pitch it will perform better than our top 11 did last season. Our best 11 is nowhere near the quality we would like but when you start from when we did the journey back is always going to be a long one.

[Jase 43,479]

1 hour ago, Belgiannutt said:

Experience yes but there's a reason why the majority of those players you named aren't gonna be starting for us. They're simply not good enough.

I understand that you wanted and expected a better performance from them we all did but let's face it Madrid have more quality in their first team and have better depth then us. This match was always going to be an up hill battle for us.

If we had played Real Madrid's first XI, then I can turn a blind eye on this but since we didn't, then I can't really do that. And I think you're over-exaggerating it to say it was an 'uphill battle'. It might have been Real Madrid but it wasn't the usual Real Madrid side that we know.

[Iggy Doonican 4,186]

Just can't believe fans take pre seaon so seriously. It's overkill just too much football these days. Ok I'm from a different generation but up to the late 90's early 2000's if you didn't go to a pre season game and I went to a few the only way you could find out the score was by looking in the Sunday papers and even then not all of them printed the results. The big factor in these games is rustiness and of course no one wanting to pick up an injury before the season starts. Last pre season was badly organised with the players gaining more air mile points then they did league points.

These competitions are for overseas fans who can't get to the Bridge or the Bernabeu hence the size of the crowd yesterday. They are commercial exercises plain and simple and have zero relevance in what happens in the up coming season. Hands up without Googling it can remember the Charity Shield of 2012 ?. Shit game played at a half empty Villa Park and we took more fans to Grimsby in 1984 then we did for that game.

[Blue_Fox_ 2,086]

How the mood changes quickly. Couldn't watch the game yet again, these times are so weird  Will tend to that tonight.
Though, people didn't believe me that with this defence Antonio will also play a deep line as soon as we start dropping points in the league, just so we can float about.
And apparently Hazard as second striker, did predict that too  
Ok I'll stop self-indulging on my predictions.

[Beepu 1,714]

11 minutes ago, Blue_Fox_ said:

How the mood changes quickly. Couldn't watch the game yet again, these times are so weird  Will tend to that tonight.
Though, people didn't believe me that with this defence Antonio will also play a deep line as soon as we start dropping points in the league, just so we can float about.
And apparently Hazard as second striker, did predict that too  
Ok I'll stop self-indulging on my predictions.

Well, I predicted that Cahill would be crap whoever he plays against. So I got that going for me..

[Bir_CFC 3,455]

Was at the game. Heard it set a record for 2nd largest crown in US football history. Had a great time, it was amazing being in a stadium with so many people.

First half was disappointing of course, but very happy with Michy in the second half and jizzed everywhere when I saw Hazard as second striker and then getting his brace.

[Iggy Doonican 4,186]

 

16 minutes ago, Bir_CFC said:

and jizzed everywhere when I saw Hazard as second striker and then getting his brace.

Hope I never sit next to you at a game mate !

[Bir_CFC 3,455]

 

Hope I never sit next to you at a game mate !

I was on the balcony. People at the lower level were not pleased.

[Laylabelle 9,300]

6 hours ago, Jason said:

If we had played Real Madrid's first XI, then I can turn a blind eye on this but since we didn't, then I can't really do that. And I think you're over-exaggerating it to say it was an 'uphill battle'. It might have been Real Madrid but it wasn't the usual Real Madrid side that we know.

Yet it was the Chelsea side we knew and that's the worry. Still same cracks in our defence..God knows what the score had it been their first team! I 

[NiclasCFC 2,582]

Why is Remy yet to play this preseason? Injured again?

[quickpassnmove 924]

The positive thing so far this preseason is that Conte has had a good look at a lot of players thus far. The only players abt which I'm curious of Conte's view are Solanke, Abraham, Hector, Clarke-Salter, Tomori and whether or not he's seen enough of Mikel to know how awful he is --but particularly what he thinks of Hector and Mikel.  

Hopefully he gets a chance to have a look at someone like J. daSilva or some other young defenders when he gets back to the UK.

[CHOULO19 24,332]

3 hours ago, NiclasCFC said:

Why is Remy yet to play this preseason? Injured again?

He played in our second preseason game. Can't remember the name of the team we faced, but it was in the one we won 3-0.