Sarri But Not Sarri Thread

[Vesper 28,968]

7 hours ago, DDA said:

But that Barca team was the greatest team ever in my opinion. I do agree though, the game is over complicated at times. 

I just hope Uncle Sarri get's us playing SarriBall so we can all rejoice in playing pretty football at last.

Our fans need to be more patient. They are never happy. 

Moan if we play like wankers but win. Moan when we lose and play like shit.

Moan moan moan.

Yes, that 2010–11 FC Barcelona team, that won 5 out of the six major trophies lineally (only losing 1 nil in Copa del Rey final to RM stopped them from being first Sextuple ever) was single greatest 1 season plus team ever, but I still rate the late 80's to early/mid 1990's AC Milan sides of Arrigo Sacchi and Fabio Capello as the best era ever. I know there is a lot of competition for that, including all of Peps Barca teams, the Bayern teams of the mid 70's, Ajax early 70's, the 5 in a row Real Madrid di Stefano sides, etc. But I think in a massive round robin tourney, those Milan sides would come out on top. Mainly because of the back 4 (Franco Baresi, Mauro Tassotti, Alessandro Costacurta and Paolo Maldini). and their MF (especially Roberto Donadoni, Ruud Gullit, Marcel Desailly, and Frank Rijkaard) plus peak Marco van Basten. They would tear up tiki-taka IMHO.

[communicate 2,703]

2 hours ago, Jason said:

It is silly to want the manager to at least be flexible or adaptable?  I'm not asking Sarri to toss his style out of the window but rather, make little tweaks to maximize out of what he's got at the moment. Instead, he has forced his style upon the players and we have been extremely dull to watch, basically playing the kind of football we saw under Mourinho/Conte at its worst. Decent in defence but horrendous in offence and the only difference is, we have more possession but even that is useless if we don't make it count. Why force your style upon the players if they can't adapt to it? Furthermore, it's easy to say that Sarri needs his kind of players to fully implement his style but this is Chelsea we're talking about. Is he ever gonna get all of his players? The board operate in their interest half of the time while Sarri has mentioned he doesn't care much about his transfers. If Sarri cannot adapt to what he's got for the time being, then it doesn't bode well for the future, does it? We criticized Mourinho/Conte in the past for being stubborn, playing the same thing over and over again etc and yet, Sarri is getting a free pass because he's only six months in, even though the warning signs are already there.

Our league position may look good but let's not pretend the football has been good to watch. We haven't played well for 90 minutes for most part of the season, if there is any at all, we have been scraping victories of late as well, winning games only because of moments of individual brilliance rather than any cohesive team play. Plus, you never quite know with this team. Take a lead or concede a goal and we suddenly lose our way in matches. A six-point lead on Arsenal and United with 16 games to go is nothing. 

If you watch our team right now what is the problem. Is it more of Sarri or our player. Our offense like you said is dull, boring but our defense is pretty good. If you told me that we will play back 4 with error prone David Luiz and slow mo Marcos Alonso as our starting 11, and our defense is good. I will think you are mad. But our defense is decent. Like you said is thank to our better ball retention. 

Offensively I think what you want is more directness, I kinda agree. We play too many short passes and they are slow passes. Jorginho performance play a factor plus we really need a striker. If we got a decent striker, I think everything will look much better. Just remember we scored some fun goals under mou after we signed Cesc and Costa. 

Btw can we stop with this kante as dm.  Does people realize how our dm is utilized in this system, his job is to play as regista. Having our best runner that have countless of stamina, spending 90% of the game sitting behind making short passes is a waste of kante talent. 

[communicate 2,703]

7 hours ago, DDA said:

But that Barca team was the greatest team ever in my opinion. I do agree though, the game is over complicated at times. 

I just hope Uncle Sarri get's us playing SarriBall so we can all rejoice in playing pretty football at last.

Our fans need to be more patient. They are never happy. 

Moan if we play like wankers but win. Moan when we lose and play like shit.

Moan moan moan.

I thinks most fans (including ours) want their team to play like Liverpool. Direct and fast

[Belgiannutt 3,201]

4 hours ago, Jason said:

It is silly to want the manager to at least be flexible or adaptable?  I'm not asking Sarri to toss his style out of the window but rather, make little tweaks to maximize out of what he's got at the moment. Instead, he has forced his style upon the players and we have been extremely dull to watch, basically playing the kind of football we saw under Mourinho/Conte at its worst. Decent in defence but horrendous in offence and the only difference is, we have more possession but even that is useless if we don't make it count. Why force your style upon the players if they can't adapt to it? Furthermore, it's easy to say that Sarri needs his kind of players to fully implement his style but this is Chelsea we're talking about. Is he ever gonna get all of his players? The board operate in their interest half of the time while Sarri has mentioned he doesn't care much about his transfers. If Sarri cannot adapt to what he's got for the time being, then it doesn't bode well for the future, does it? We criticized Mourinho/Conte in the past for being stubborn, playing the same thing over and over again etc and yet, Sarri is getting a free pass because he's only six months in, even though the warning signs are already there.

Our league position may look good but let's not pretend the football has been good to watch. We haven't played well for 90 minutes for most part of the season, if there is any at all, we have been scraping victories of late as well, winning games only because of moments of individual brilliance rather than any cohesive team play. Plus, you never quite know with this team. Take a lead or concede a goal and we suddenly lose our way in matches. A six-point lead on Arsenal and United with 16 games to go is nothing. 

I already said why it's silly. We brought Sarri in to play attacking possession football. He's trying to implement that and now you want him to divert from that to be more pragmatic. 

Even if it's little tweaks every step away from attacking possession football will slow down the process of getting there. Also what "little " tweaks are you talking about because the most popular "little" tweak among our fan base is putting Kante on the 6 instead of Jorginho.

That's not a little tweak, that's not a little step. That is an enormous step away from possession football and towards more pragmatic football. 

"Why force your style " Euhm because we brought him in precisely because of his style...

"basically playing the kind of football we saw under Mourinho/Conte at its worst."  Ridiculous statement. Mourinho barely attempted to play out from the back and Conte tried but once teams figured us out and pressed us he was completely clueless on how to solve it. 

Comparing that to the way we press, keep possession and play out from the back (even under immense pressure) under Sarri. A lot of work goes into that. The final third is where things  go wrong and that is largely down to the lack of a proper striker and the lack of a quality RW (and fullbacks that aren't good going forward)

"Is he ever gonna get all his players" Not in 1 transferwindow. It is going to take time. Piece by piece, brick by brick. The players that don't adapt need to be replaced. This was always going to be a long term process. 

 

"A six-point lead on Arsenal and United with 16 games to go is nothing. " Nothing ? 6 points is a nice cushion and we're only 1 point behind Tottenham. 

And again all without a proper striker. 

 

[Antonio8 736]

with crespo, drogba, lampard is simple to play simple football 

 

[Johnnyeye 7,443]

7 minutes ago, Antonio8 said:

with crespo, drogba, lampard is simple to play simple football 

 

miss those guys, great times

[Adnane 1,101]

This "attacking possession football" is so overrated these days.

You need a once in a lifetime player like Messi to play the Guardiola way AND sustain consistent title and champions league challenges. 

No other team was ever able to play that way and challenge as much, the closes thing to it currently is Liverpool, who have a huge amount of off the ball workers ( if you wonder why the likes of Wijnaldum and obviously Milner play week in week out ). 

Their press has nothing to do with ours, the quality of the players they have upfront either. 

In his first year, Klopp took over in October and still finished 8th. The following year he finished 4th, 1 point above the Wenger Arsenal that many deemed terrible without, without playing a single European game. Last year they finished 4th, once again barely above us whereas we were having one of our worst seasons in the Roman era. 

It took them 3 years to fully reach the potential they were craving, and Klopp had to test and fail before getting it right, I don't think Sarri will have enough time nor board support to do that, I don't think what he is aiming to reach is worth it. 

 

This club has always been about winning, even with limited squads we still had the "win at all costs and play nice if possible" mindset like in the 2017 title, we are moving away from that and it's sad to se for me at least.

[kc_blue 265]

I think the telling point will be where we are this time next year.  I'd like to think we'll be in a better place for all concerned but I have doubts.  Those doubts mainly hinge on our board more then the manager.

[Belgiannutt 3,201]

24 minutes ago, Adnane said:

This "attacking possession football" is so overrated these days.

You need a once in a lifetime player like Messi to play the Guardiola way AND sustain consistent title and champions league challenges. 

No other team was ever able to play that way and challenge as much, the closes thing to it currently is Liverpool, who have a huge amount of off the ball workers ( if you wonder why the likes of Wijnaldum and obviously Milner play week in week out ). 

Their press has nothing to do with ours, the quality of the players they have upfront either. 

In his first year, Klopp took over in October and still finished 8th. The following year he finished 4th, 1 point above the Wenger Arsenal that many deemed terrible without, without playing a single European game. Last year they finished 4th, once again barely above us whereas we were having one of our worst seasons in the Roman era. 

It took them 3 years to fully reach the potential they were craving, and Klopp had to test and fail before getting it right, I don't think Sarri will have enough time nor board support to do that, I don't think what he is aiming to reach is worth it. 

 

This club has always been about winning, even with limited squads we still had the "win at all costs and play nice if possible" mindset like in the 2017 title, we are moving away from that and it's sad to se for me at least.

And look where that got us. Sacrificing long term for short term isn't a smart bet. We won 2 titles but everytime it felt like we went 1 step forward to then take 3 steps back.  Nearly every single top team knows how to play out from the back and how to press. Conte and Mourinho were both incapable of implementing this. 

Funny how you're forgetting that Liverpool reached the CL final with overrated attacking possession football. 

Also attacking possession football is a pretty wide scope. Plenty of different ways to play attacking possession football. It's not as one dimensional as you're making it sound.

Each their opinion but i like the progression we've made this season and i really don't miss the shit on a stick football we saw under Conte and Mourinho. 

[Antonio8 736]

43 minutes ago, Adnane said:

This "attacking possession football" is so overrated these days.

You need a once in a lifetime player like Messi to play the Guardiola way AND sustain consistent title and champions league challenges. 

No other team was ever able to play that way and challenge as much, the closes thing to it currently is Liverpool, who have a huge amount of off the ball workers ( if you wonder why the likes of Wijnaldum and obviously Milner play week in week out ). 

Their press has nothing to do with ours, the quality of the players they have upfront either. 

In his first year, Klopp took over in October and still finished 8th. The following year he finished 4th, 1 point above the Wenger Arsenal that many deemed terrible without, without playing a single European game. Last year they finished 4th, once again barely above us whereas we were having one of our worst seasons in the Roman era. 

It took them 3 years to fully reach the potential they were craving, and Klopp had to test and fail before getting it right, I don't think Sarri will have enough time nor board support to do that, I don't think what he is aiming to reach is worth it. 

 

This club has always been about winning, even with limited squads we still had the "win at all costs and play nice if possible" mindset like in the 2017 title, we are moving away from that and it's sad to se for me at least.

to complete your discussion, liverpool became a very good team when they bought van djik and now allison so it is not only an attacking football' issue

question is to have wonderful players in every role. and chelsea lacks of a wonderful striker 

 

[Magic Lamps 11,668]

4 minutes ago, Belgiannutt said:

And look where that got us. Sacrificing long term for short term isn't a smart bet. We won 2 titles but everytime it felt like we went 1 step forward to then take 3 steps back.  Nearly every single top team knows how to play out from the back and how to press. Conte and Mourinho were both incapable of implementing this. 

Funny how you're forgetting that Liverpool reached the CL final with overrated attacking possession football. 

Also attacking possession football is a pretty wide scope. Plenty of different ways to play attacking possession football. It's not as one dimensional as you're making it sound.

Each their opinion but i like the progression we've made this season and i really don't miss the shit on a stick football we saw under Conte and Mourinho. 

I think you made your point  very clear. And you maybe right. Maybe it is indeed the right thing to back one manager one philosophy no matter what. But i am dead cert the club will not have enough patience with Sarri and he will be gone before the end of the 2020 season and we will revert to another stop gap manager to win the odd title. And I dont mind actually. I dont give a shit about attacking or posession football. I enjoyed the power play of thr 2004 to 2010 squad and Conte counter attacking nuch more than i wouöd ever enjoy Sarriball or tiki taka. The only thing i would sacrifice short zerm titles for is blooding in youngsters from the academy..i hope we will at some point have a manager who is good at that

[Adnane 1,101]

I think you made your point  very clear. And you maybe right. Maybe it is indeed the right thing to back one manager one philosophy no matter what. But i am dead cert the club will not have enough patience with Sarri and he will be gone before the end of the 2020 season and we will revert to another stop gap manager to win the odd title. And I dont mind actually. I dont give a shit about attacking or posession football. I enjoyed the power play of thr 2004 to 2010 squad and Conte counter attacking nuch more than i wouöd ever enjoy Sarriball or tiki taka. The only thing i would sacrifice short zerm titles for is blooding in youngsters from the academy..i hope we will at some point have a manager who is good at that

I think we might be disappointed now because we were so luck and spoiled back then, the only comparable feeling i see in the future is to see one of the old guard appointed, the fans would genuinely reconnect with the team and players.

Not saying it's the right thing to do, but the thrill would be high.

Sent from my INE-LX1 using Tapatalk

[Tomo 21,733]

9 hours ago, Jason said:

It is silly to want the manager to at least be flexible or adaptable?  I'm not asking Sarri to toss his style out of the window but rather, make little tweaks to maximize out of what he's got at the moment. Instead, he has forced his style upon the players and we have been extremely dull to watch, basically playing the kind of football we saw under Mourinho/Conte at its worst.  

Not even close, the football now is not great but not even close to how bad it was under Conte and especially Jose at rock bottom. When it was bad under Conte we were playing like a little team even against little teams and under Jose in 15-16 we couldn't even pass the ball properly.

9 hours ago, Jason said:

 Why force your style upon the players if they can't adapt to it? Furthermore, it's easy to say that Sarri needs his kind of players to fully implement his style but this is Chelsea we're talking about. Is he ever gonna get all of his players? The board operate in their interest half of the time while Sarri has mentioned he doesn't care much about his transfers. If Sarri cannot adapt to what he's got for the time being, then it doesn't bode well for the future, does it? We criticized Mourinho/Conte in the past for being stubborn, playing the same thing over and over again etc and yet, Sarri is getting a free pass because he's only six months in, even though the warning signs are already there.

This could all change in the blink of the eye but so far so good. Kepa, Jorginho, Kova and Pulisic all fit his style.

Plus if we are going down the route of adapting to who is here right now we might as well sack Sarri and bring in a pragmatic manager again, bringing in a manager like Sarri is commiting to a change of direction. Plus, the big pro argument towards reverting back to type in the past was we still had a chance of one or both of the major trophies, this time we ain't even in the CL and have no chance in the PL.

Furthermore he has in a way adapted as much as he can without compromising his system (which he shouldn't do, if he starts telling the players to sit back and play on the counter even for a game they will subconsciously hit the comfort zone and not fully commit to the restart, it may sound sensible on paper but in practice it's the opposite), we seem a lot more cautious on the ball than at the beginning of the season which may point to Sarri realising a fair chunk of the players can't go all in on his football without the team looking vulnerable.

Can i with 100% assurance say Sarri will be a success? No and if we are still performing like this in October i will be the most vocal wanting a change but all things considered right now he deserves the benefit of the doubt.

1 hour ago, Adnane said:

This club has always been about winning, even with limited squads we still had the "win at all costs and play nice if possible" mindset like in the 2017 title, we are moving away from that and it's sad to se for me at least.

Yeah,throughout all of this decade pre Sarri it has basically been the sticky plaster route and fair play it's been successful in terms of trophies but we have also been helped by the fact that there was no standout team which allowed us to pounce by putting all our eggs in the "now" basket. Now we have two outstanding teams that look set to get 90 plus points in a season for the foreseeable future so to catch up and keep up we need to try and build something sustainable.

[Adnane 1,101]

8 minutes ago, Tomo said:

Yeah,throughout all of this decade pre Sarri it has basically been the sticky plaster route and fair play it's been successful in terms of trophies but we have also been helped by the fact that there was no standout team which allowed us to pounce by putting all our eggs in the "now" basket. Now we have two outstanding teams that look set to get 90 plus points in a season for the foreseeable future so to catch up and keep up we need to try and build something sustainable.

Right, but we don't have to play like them to compete. 

In fact, I am not sure we will ever fund well enough to reach that. 

I would much rather prefer a pragmatic coach ( not defensive, there is a huge difference, Ferguson was pragmatic, Mourinho early days as well, Mourinho last years is indeed defensive ).

And talking about short-long term, you can still build a sustainable strong flexible team to compete on the long run, Simeone's Atletico and Juve are the perfect examples in fact. The latter specifically do not shy away from adjusting to opposition when they need to, they are not stubborn enough to think that they can beat everyone the same way and they are now reaping rewards of that. 

[Tomo 21,733]

8 minutes ago, Adnane said:

Right, but we don't have to play like them to compete. 

In fact, I am not sure we will ever fund well enough to reach that. 

I would much rather prefer a pragmatic coach ( not defensive, there is a huge difference, Ferguson was pragmatic, Mourinho early days as well, Mourinho last years is indeed defensive ).

And talking about short-long term, you can still build a sustainable strong flexible team to compete on the long run, Simeone's Atletico and Juve are the perfect examples in fact. The latter specifically do not shy away from adjusting to opposition when they need to, they are not stubborn enough to think that they can beat everyone the same way and they are now reaping rewards of that. 

Simeone's Atletico usually fall short in title races due to lack of quality and cohesion in attack (compared to Barca and Madrid), they have these awkward draws against the Valladolid's of this world that the latter two simply blow away (not so much this season but in general of recent years). 

We don't have to play exactly like them but this era of football is wavering towards a more aggressive, possession based game and most importantly, that's what the modern day players enjoy the most. 

[Adnane 1,101]

1 minute ago, Tomo said:

Simeone's Atletico usually fall short in title races due to lack of quality and cohesion in attack (compared to Barca and Madrid), they have these awkward draws against the Valladolid's of this world that the latter two simply blow away (not so much this season but in general of recent years). 

That is entirely down to decision makers quality as far as I'm concerned, it's hard to beat Messi and Ronaldo teams on the long term. 

Barcelona have been absolutely shambolic ( voluntarily ) defensively in the last 8 years or so and have managed to stay relevant on top of the pyramid football for the one sole reason we all know. 

If it was not for Ronaldo, Real Madrid would have won 1 or 2 CLs max, maybe not a single one, in the last two years he has just been totally cheated starting February, knocks teams out by himself. 

And Atletico still managed to compete and famously knocked out Barcelona twice and Bayern if you indeed want a glimpse on how a ell organized team can do. See, we're not talking winning per se, just staying relevant, if we managed to do that consistently I will be a happy man, we have tried the long free flowing route twice before ( Scolari + AVB ) and we all know how it ended. I am not sure it will ever work here and that's okay because I believe that this fanbase enjoys competitive Chelsea teams more than okay-ish easy on the eye generations ( 2012-2013 also comes to mind ). 

The whole identity thing is bollocks, we have a huge platform to actually center our identity around winning for the next 30 years or so based on what we achieved in the last decade, our fans enjoy it, we thrive on it. 

In fact, the more it goes the likelier it seems to be linked to commercial revenues, a generally perceived pleasant to watch team by today's possession biased standards surely has more chance of attracting tourists, sponsors, etc. 

[Jase 43,479]

5 hours ago, Belgiannutt said:

I already said why it's silly. We brought Sarri in to play attacking possession football. He's trying to implement that and now you want him to divert from that to be more pragmatic. 

Even if it's little tweaks every step away from attacking possession football will slow down the process of getting there. Also what "little " tweaks are you talking about because the most popular "little" tweak among our fan base is putting Kante on the 6 instead of Jorginho.

That's not a little tweak, that's not a little step. That is an enormous step away from possession football and towards more pragmatic football.

How on earth does tweaking things mean ditching the attacking football? Changing formation suddenly means you're changing the style? Changing personnel means you're no longer playing attacking football? Even Guardiola constantly tweaks things here and there without sacrificing his attacking football. And for the record, I never said anything about putting Kante in Jorginho's position here.

5 hours ago, Belgiannutt said:

"Why force your style " Euhm because we brought him in precisely because of his style...

"basically playing the kind of football we saw under Mourinho/Conte at its worst."  Ridiculous statement. Mourinho barely attempted to play out from the back and Conte tried but once teams figured us out and pressed us he was completely clueless on how to solve it. 

Yeah, we brought in Sarri to change our style but he's forcing it on players who don't suit it, resulting us in playing some absolutely dross football. You can say we barely attempted to play out from the back under Mourinho or Conte were clueless on solving problems once he got sussed but at the end of the day, we're still no better in going forward than we were under them. We were promised "fun" football by Sarri but there has barely been anything fun about the way we play, not even a tiny bit of excitement. 

5 hours ago, Belgiannutt said:

Comparing that to the way we press, keep possession and play out from the back (even under immense pressure) under Sarri. A lot of work goes into that. The final third is where things  go wrong and that is largely down to the lack of a proper striker and the lack of a quality RW (and fullbacks that aren't good going forward)

The way we press under Sarri? We still look to drop back whenever we lose the ball and we certainly don't press high up the pitch and/or as a cohesive unit like City, Liverpool or even Spurs. 

5 hours ago, Belgiannutt said:

"Is he ever gonna get all his players" Not in 1 transferwindow. It is going to take time. Piece by piece, brick by brick. The players that don't adapt need to be replaced. This was always going to be a long term process. 

You said that as if the club ever plan things long term, plan things thoroughly, work in sync with the manager. If our recent history is anything to go by, Sarri will be lucky to stay here for more than 2 years!

5 hours ago, Belgiannutt said:

"A six-point lead on Arsenal and United with 16 games to go is nothing. " Nothing ? 6 points is a nice cushion and we're only 1 point behind Tottenham. 

Pardon me for not feeling good as you about the 6-point lead because this team blow way too hot and cold to be trusted on a consistent basis and remember last season when we were sitting comfortable in 2nd in January 2018? Yeah, we then fell off the cliff and finished only ahead of Arsenal. If we have the 6-point advantage with 6 games to go, then by all means, brag about it and be confident that we'll hold onto it. But there are still 16 games to go and that 6 points could easily disappear if we lose to Arsenal and Man City in our next four games. 

[Jase 43,479]

7 hours ago, communicate said:

If you watch our team right now what is the problem. Is it more of Sarri or our player. Our offense like you said is dull, boring but our defense is pretty good. If you told me that we will play back 4 with error prone David Luiz and slow mo Marcos Alonso as our starting 11, and our defense is good. I will think you are mad. But our defense is decent. Like you said is thank to our better ball retention. 

Offensively I think what you want is more directness, I kinda agree. We play too many short passes and they are slow passes. Jorginho performance play a factor plus we really need a striker. If we got a decent striker, I think everything will look much better. Just remember we scored some fun goals under mou after we signed Cesc and Costa. 

Btw can we stop with this kante as dm.  Does people realize how our dm is utilized in this system, his job is to play as regista. Having our best runner that have countless of stamina, spending 90% of the game sitting behind making short passes is a waste of kante talent. 

Be quick and direct (not by just lumping the ball forward aimlessly of course) indeed. For instance, notice how Hazard's take-on numbers have dropped this season? We're playing so slow that Hazard hasn't had many opportunities of being in 1 v 1 situations and causing chaos.