closed Southampton 0-2 Chelsea

[DYC. 7,542]

Azpilicueta running things at the back again. This role suits his qualities perfectly.

Mose bossing the wingback role yet again. He's no Dani Alves or Cafu but he's fulfilling his duties on both ends of the pitch and his ability to carry the ball forwards brings a nice element of surprise. Big up, Vic.

Kante is getting better and better, Honestly thought the level of his performances were exaggerated at the start of the season but he's looked like a top player in the past month or so. Fantastic ball-winning, his athleticism to cover so much space so quickly (always running back when attacked, recovering his position and slowing counter-attacks down). And then there's his surprisingly good passing range, distribution and ability to hold the ball under pressure. Every passing game he's proving he's much more than a ball-winner.

Credit to Nemanja 'Stickman' Matic. Looking like a player again. It took him ages but it's going well. Still think Chels need an upgrade for the long-term but he's fine for now.

Hazard has quietly been playing on a high level since the Euros. 15/16 is well behind him. I like the fact that things are quiet concerning him. Let him just go about his business. He created a lot chances today but that hasn't been the case for most of the season. Need more of that from him. But then again, he's scored five in ten and if he scores 20 in the league alone, it will be forgiven.

[JDY 1,290]

Perfect 2nd half. This Southampton team have given everyone trouble and we completely shut them down. Every player was good just like our last 4 games.

[Jase 43,479]

28 minutes ago, CHOULO19 said:

Not a brilliant performance by any stretch, but a professionally controlled one, particularly in the second half. 

We're the first ONLY team to win at St. Marry's this year. 

Fixed.

[DDA 10,006]

I'm giving Luiz motm. He didn't put a foot wrong today apart from letting Austin drift in behind him which he was offside for anyway.

Stellar performaces from everyone on that pitch today. Alonso looked a little shaky at times when defending but he gets up and down the wing well. 

Moses is looking excellent in his new found position.

[CHOULO19 24,332]

14 minutes ago, Jason said:

Fixed.

No, "messed up", because that would imply that no other team can win there from now till the end of the year. 

Got to work on your grammar, Jay... 

[Styles 9,790]

Solid performance. Could have scored a few more but hey ho.

Lol, even Cahill was picking out passes for fun in the second half. This team has changed a lot in just  a few weeks.

So far, no opponent had set up differently to counter this 343 formation.

If we keep winning and keeping clean sheets teams will start to change their usual approach against us.

[Darogba 112]

I wonder how long we can keep this 3-4-3 for before other teams adapt to deal with us. Hopefully conte will have an answer.

[BlueStorm1003 539]

I must admit I came a bit nervous, but the defensive work today was top notch! Conte really has got them working their asses off for the team. Love it.

If Diego and Eden can keep this form, I can see us giving city a headache next month.

Come on you blues!!!

[Fernando 6,603]

2 minutes ago, Darogba said:

I wonder how long we can keep this 3-4-3 for before other teams adapt to deal with us. Hopefully conte will have an answer.

If it can last till the next transfer window before we can buy players, then good. 

 

[Jase 43,479]

4 minutes ago, CHOULO19 said:

No, "messed up", because that would imply that no other team can win there from now till the end of the year. 

Got to work on your grammar, Jay... 

Well, we are the only team to win at Southampton this year. That's the hard fact now. Whether or not another team will win is a different matter.

[CHOULO19 24,332]

2 minutes ago, Jason said:

Well, we are the only team to win at Southampton this year. That's the hard fact now. Whether or not another team will win is a different matter.

Mate, unless you add 'so far' at the end, that statement is factually incorrect.

I don't like to correct people's grammar, but you kind of started it!

[BXL70 396]

That Chelsea is outstanding. Once again. We have been waiting for too long but now here we go again.

Difficult to single out a player. Eden and Diego are on fire for sure. Special mention to Moses: he is extremely good and a large contributor to our current success as well.

Our best transfer was Conte. 

[Jase 43,479]

15 minutes ago, CHOULO19 said:

Mate, unless you add 'so far' at the end, that statement is factually incorrect.

I don't like to correct people's grammar, but you kind of started it!

(1) It's a matter of different interpretation, (2) grammar is so overrated and (3) I've missed arguing with you.

[Kezza 1,965]

What I’m loving at the moment is our proactive mentality to the games. No more do we wait til the 60^th-70^th min or til we are one goal down to actually kick it into 4^th gear

[Amblève. 4,995]

The refs deserve huge credit for their performances, too. Aside from not handing Romeu a yellow card for his foul on Costa Mike Jones was fantastic, the same goes for the linesman that saw Austin's knee being offside.

[Barbara 15,149]

What a sweet Italian lemonade.

What our personnel is far from ideal and we are way behind other teams concerning squad quality and depth, what Conte has done with the players in this system is nothing short of fantastic.

He worked the team in such a way that not only Matic is playing his level again, but had Luiz mastering a center defender position - this is nearly a miracle. Even Gary-back away- Cahill has been performing above his league.

Moses has been showing to be a player I've never seen him before. He's always shown glimpses of something good and went through long - and painful - streaks of nothing but ordinary.

It's the perfect case of adapting your system to the material you have available. Some players are overachieving already and some were allowed to perform at their best because of the system.

I've made myself clear about Pedro, but indeed Willian has shown nothing promising either, which imo makes this situation simple to solve: our main and biggest target in the winter window must be someone to play upfront with Hazard and Costa - who btw fit in the category of playing that have a system allowing them to shine as they can.

Big game coming next week with Everton in quite form. We have had some crazy matches against them, have dominated, have been dominated, had that crazy 3-6 two years ago. It's a sort of an unpredictable match, one that will test this formation the farthest so far, but I'm confident we will deliver.

Very happy with and for the lads, and especially Conte.

[Bosnian Blue 2,471]

Brilliant lads, now lets do one more on Everton and go on international break with a huge smile on our faces.

Today apart from maybe 20-25 minutes in the first half when Soton had us in our 30 yards for a good period of time (but also created nothing worth mentioning), everything else worked fantastic. Keep it up!

[Essien19 1,415]

The moment one of the Chelsea lads played it a bit too short to Kanté in the second half and the french international -always two steps ahead recovered by laying his full body weight into the opponent, pointless to say that he easily hold on to the ball... the boy can do no wrong, he's the best thing happened to Chelsea FC (in midfield) since Makélélé...

it's about time for a song similar to West Hams version of 'we've got Payet'...

[Cosmin 2,484]

12 minutes ago, Bosnian Blue said:

international break

Arghhhh you're right, we're already close to the next international break  

[edetarod 2,155]

very solid and professional performance at a difficult ground

reminded me of the Stoke away game which we also won 2-0 that year we won the title in 2015

let's hope for a similar outcome