closed Chelsea v West Brom

[gadget 126]

IF and a big IF, Conte wants to change formation it can only be to be more attacking against a team he feels will just defend then its has to change to 4-2-4, with Michy/Willian in for Moses/Cahill

[BlueLyon 9,359]

The opponent is strong. Their defense proven to be hard to break this season. They have good run of form, so that team should not be underestimated, or our men will face bitter end. Their attack is efficient. One mistake and we will get punished for. But most of all, their coach will do everything in his power to silence the Stamford Bridge. To stop our winning run. To prove a point.

I present you the Pulis test. 

Yes, yes another big, nasty, test against coach some say its destined to cause us trouble. 

But beware, under Conte we gathered strong army that does underestimate no enemy. We will throw everything at them. We will show WBA the blue hell at SB. Mr. Pulis, we will give you a test bigger than your forehead.

Who will come on top? Pulis with a clever trick, or will Conte come on top with elegant, but fighting spirit? 

Find out next week in yet another test of Chelsea season. 

Seriously, next few weeks when we will face many teams, when we will have less time to rest, when players will play against smaller, but sneaky teams, when players will start thinking about what Santa will bring them for Christmas, it will be our biggest test of the season so far.

Come on, lets test ourselves with another test that will test all our abilities that no other test so far could test. 

And let us be victorious after all these tests, so that the tests will no longer be tests for us, but for our opponents. 

[Blue Colored Sky 1,807]

I just discovered that West Brom outscored Man United this season.

(Yet Mourinho talks how they play expansive attacking football)

I'm genuinely shocked after that discovery.

 

 

[jernej93 565]

Courtois
Azpi - Luiz - Zouma
Moses - Chalobah - Kante - Alonso
Pedro - Costa - Hazard 

 

[MichaelDance 552]

One of our easiest games Chelsea 3 - 0 West Brom.

[Blue Colored Sky 1,807]

58 minutes ago, MichaelDance said:

One of our easiest games Chelsea 3 - 0 West Brom.

I hope Conte won't say this to the players.

I wonder if Fabregas will play. Even if Matic does recover in time then you think it's perfect game to utilise Cesc but not at the expense of an attacker, Hazard and Diego are certain to play but Pedro movement will come handy here. I wouldn't want to lose it.

Matic should sit out this game and be ready for Sunderland away 3 days later.

I still don't have a clue how to save wing-backs from overburning with 3 games in 6 days. The only idea is to not have a wing-backs for one game. But changing formation sounds so stupid for me.

[Chelsea Legend 11 4,062]

This one worries me a bit only because we haven't really been on the front foot for a few weeks now. Most of our recent successes have been on the counter attack so its gonna be hard to know whether or not attacking Chelsea can come to the foreground. 

We will no doubt need to get off to a quick start and force them to open up a bit, with that in mind I'd love see Cesc start in the middle again. I realize he's not the most tactically sound player we have in our squad but I don't really envision West Brom coming to the Bridge and playing expansive football and exploiting the gaps Fab may leave. 

I also think its time we start utilizing the squad more. We're entering into the busiest run of games of the season and for us to come out of it unscathed we will need to rely on what little squad depth we have. I'm not talking wholesale changes but maybe 1 - 2 players tops in any one game. If we don't use them now if/when we encounter an injury we could have a major setback due to the fact the squad players aren't up to the speed of the game.

I really believe WBA are punching well above their weight class recently and in truth we should role them over at home but as most have said this is the Premier League where easy games a few and far between.

Having said that the lads should be buzzing after two impressive wins against direct rivals! Now we must take it to the teams we're supposed to beat.

No predictions but if we play our game they won't be able to cope

[OneMoSalah 8,609]

2 hours ago, Chelsea Legend 11 said:

This one worries me a bit only because we haven't really been on the front foot for a few weeks now. Most of our recent successes have been on the counter attack so its gonna be hard to know whether or not attacking Chelsea can come to the foreground. 

We will no doubt need to get off to a quick start and force them to open up a bit, with that in mind I'd love see Cesc start in the middle again. I realize he's not the most tactically sound player we have in our squad but I don't really envision West Brom coming to the Bridge and playing expansive football and exploiting the gaps Fab may leave. 

I also think its time we start utilizing the squad more. We're entering into the busiest run of games of the season and for us to come out of it unscathed we will need to rely on what little squad depth we have. I'm not talking wholesale changes but maybe 1 - 2 players tops in any one game. If we don't use them now if/when we encounter an injury we could have a major setback due to the fact the squad players aren't up to the speed of the game.

I really believe WBA are punching well above their weight class recently and in truth we should role them over at home but as most have said this is the Premier League where easy games a few and far between.

Having said that the lads should be buzzing after two impressive wins against direct rivals! Now we must take it to the teams we're supposed to beat.

No predictions but if we play our game they won't be able to cope

 

I think that will be precisely what they will look to do to be honest, look to exploit that spaces behind Alonso and Moses and try get players in between our midfield and back 3 as well as behind it. Not expansive football though!  

They will probably soak up pressure hoping we play a high line then play on the break. I think they will also try to use Rondon up against Azpi to try and play off second balls from knock downs a lot too as well as the usual set piece threats they have.

This will be a tough match, they won't want the ball as much as a Spurs, United or a City, so let's hope we are able to break them down, they will almost definitely have 2 banks of 4 or even everyone behind the ball if they have to and that's not disrespectful to West Brom because they are very good at that and have won points off good teams with it before under Pulis. 

Still think we shouldn't change a winning team except for Matic in maybe but this will be an busy time for us. Maybe the likes of Zouma, Batshuayi, Willian, Oscar will get more regular minutes from the bench as opposed to 5 minutes or whatever some of them are averaging this season from the bench but I can't see 5 or 6 changes to the team every game. 

[Jase 43,479]

4 minutes ago, Mana said:

No person in this forum (apart from you) gives two monkeys about Loserpool. TC doesn't mind members joining who support a different rival club, but if you're here just to piss us off then it won't be long before you're banned.

Chill Mana. He has been taken out of the equation.

[Chelsea Legend 11 4,062]

2 hours ago, OneMoSalah said:

 

I think that will be precisely what they will look to do to be honest, look to exploit that spaces behind Alonso and Moses and try get players in between our midfield and back 3 as well as behind it. Not expansive football though!  

They will probably soak up pressure hoping we play a high line then play on the break. I think they will also try to use Rondon up against Azpi to try and play off second balls from knock downs a lot too as well as the usual set piece threats they have.

This will be a tough match, they won't want the ball as much as a Spurs, United or a City, so let's hope we are able to break them down, they will almost definitely have 2 banks of 4 or even everyone behind the ball if they have to and that's not disrespectful to West Brom because they are very good at that and have won points off good teams with it before under Pulis. 

Still think we shouldn't change a winning team except for Matic in maybe but this will be an busy time for us. Maybe the likes of Zouma, Batshuayi, Willian, Oscar will get more regular minutes from the bench as opposed to 5 minutes or whatever some of them are averaging this season from the bench but I can't see 5 or 6 changes to the team every game. 

The areas in behind the wingbacks are to be defensed by the LCB and RCB. I tried to highlight the defensive responsibilities of the mids and CB's in the diagram. 

Truly we should have no trouble in this game if we press them high and force them to make passing decisions sooner than they'd like. They are an awful passing team so we should be able to keep the ball and win the ball a lot.

 

[AlesJuve 264]

Real test is coming?

[Hybrid Angel 2,130]

What I like about Conte is that he's got a title-winning mentality, he pays the same attention to each and every game. I don't wanna jinx it, but I believe complacency is not gonna be an issue under Antonio. I remember that during the Euros Giacherrini said, "Conte doesn't leave anything to chance". There is a reason he won his first Serie A title carrying Juve from seventh(from the previous season) to the top, and two seasons later he went on to go the entire season undefeated. 

He is a very self-critical manager and never accepts complacency. You can see it in his words: 'Work' and 'Improve'. 

[Muzchap 8,964]

I'm going to this - so we best be winning 😂😂😂

[BoyBlue96 990]

Reading reports on Twitter that Diego, Pedro and Matic are out of the squad for the WBA match....

[Special Juan 27,092]

14 hours ago, AlesJuve said:

Real test is coming?

If 1-0 down to Spurs and win 2-1, and 1-0 down to City away isn't a test I don't know what is.

We should take nothing for granted but right now lots of positives.

[the wes 7,212]

2 hours ago, BoyBlue96 said:

Reading reports on Twitter that Diego, Pedro and Matic are out of the squad for the WBA match....

I hope not ffs Willian Batsman and fabregas will have to come in 

[BoyBlue96 990]

Just now, the wes said:

I hope not ffs Willian Batsman and fabregas will have to come in 

I trust them all, especially Batsman.

[iceboy 992]

If anyone cares: Oscar and Terry are out the rest are ok.