I just hope that AVB gets the players he wants in quickly.. I am tired of this squad stuck between 2 styles of play and I really feel AVB should start now by clearing off as much deadwood as he can because at the rate we are going, we may not even be in the CL next season and that would be catastrophic for this club
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I just hope that AVB gets the players he wants in quickly.. I am tired of this squad stuck between 2 styles of play and I really feel AVB should start now by clearing off as much deadwood as he can because at the rate we are going, we may not even be in the CL next season and that would be catastrophic for this club
He is better than Malouda/Kalou so he is a start...
Shakthar have great players a few would do a job at Chelsea.
We were linked with Jadson in the summer
Jadson's no longer a Shakhtar player
Gone to Sao Paulo.Chelsea boss Andre Villas-Boas rules out bids for cup-tied midfielders Willian & Eden Hazard - Goal.com
Abit contradicting....
But I still hope someone like willian will come in.
Abit contradicting....
But I still hope someone like willian will come in.
Something that si really ******* me off with Chelsea fans on twitter is they lick Torres' **** too much. Like today when Torres messed something up it was all " aww unlucky Torres" and "Better luck next time that was a hard chance" but if anyone else in the team messes up its "OMFG WHAT WAS THAT YOUR ****!" and " PLEASE LEAVE THE CLUB YOU PIECE OF ****!" Seriously all because Torres cost 50 mil everyone sticks up for him alot more then the rest. I could name a ton of players I would rather keep at the club then Torres tbh.
Hmm, I don't what Chelsea fans you're following, but most of the ones I'm following weren't saying unlucky.
TheRealMourinho
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does anyone see kakuta as a future first team player at chelsea?
he was hyped up alot a couple of years ago but now he has died down and not his fault tbh a poor loan spell at bolton didnt help either, but honestly i havent seen him play for quite some time now so it would be unfair for me to comment but it seems that he isnt at that standard.
he was hyped up alot a couple of years ago but now he has died down and not his fault tbh a poor loan spell at bolton didnt help either, but honestly i havent seen him play for quite some time now so it would be unfair for me to comment but it seems that he isnt at that standard.
Time's up for Torres | Sky Sports | Shows | Sunday Supplement
orghhghghhh **** oooff!
leave him alone you bastards!
orghhghghhh **** oooff!
leave him alone you bastards!
Its a tough one, this is my first comment on this by the way.
Im lucky enough to go to most home games, and its a confusing season i must say. AVB does have a future, BUT some of his tactics really do confuse me and the fans around me. Mikel was once behind Messi in the most promising U21 players, he was an attacking player but Mourinho ruined him in my opinion, he is now a slow CDM with awful vision and passing. Now onto the subject of Torres. We had one patch in which he scored goals, against Genk and West Ham. West Ham he looked on fire then he got sent off. Since then i personally have not seen him at his best, however against Sunderland he got MoM but didn't carry that over to Carrow Road. Missing an awful chance.
AVB does have a future, but needs to get his tactics finalized and sign a few key players.
Players to sign
Gotze
Hazard
Cavani
Di Maria
Someone like Scott Parker or Modric
Im lucky enough to go to most home games, and its a confusing season i must say. AVB does have a future, BUT some of his tactics really do confuse me and the fans around me. Mikel was once behind Messi in the most promising U21 players, he was an attacking player but Mourinho ruined him in my opinion, he is now a slow CDM with awful vision and passing. Now onto the subject of Torres. We had one patch in which he scored goals, against Genk and West Ham. West Ham he looked on fire then he got sent off. Since then i personally have not seen him at his best, however against Sunderland he got MoM but didn't carry that over to Carrow Road. Missing an awful chance.
AVB does have a future, but needs to get his tactics finalized and sign a few key players.
Players to sign
Gotze
Hazard
Cavani
Di Maria
Someone like Scott Parker or Modric
Glad to have you here ^^. I'm going have to disagree with you on a few things though.
He's not finishing the chances that he gets but to be fair he's not getting many chances. He's taking an average shots of 2.2 shots per game which is alright but a little low considering that he should be the end point of most of our attacks. The real problem is that chances created for him are primarily coming down the flanks, so he's feeding off of a lot of crosses and squared balls where his natural abilities suit through balls and more defence splitting passes. That's why we're slowly shifting to a 4-2-3-1: that gives Torres a natural playmaker just behind, feeding him with the kind of passes he needs. Our current 4-3-3 is great but it has 2 massive problems:
1.There's no diagonal balls, it's all straight forwards, sideways or backwards. United showed at the start of the season exactly what you can do with a fast striker and players that are capable of playing incisive, diagonal passes from deep.
2. We have neither a passer or a creator in it. In the established 4-3-3, the 2 man midfield of the 4-4-2 (creator, destroyer) is expanded with the addition of the passer. There's a lot written about this and I'm not going to bore you if you already know it (if not, just say and I'll post some links) but it's pretty clear that Ramires is more of a shuttler (endless energy, takes care of a lot of the transition between attack and defend) whilst Meireles and Lampard are both box to box types. Whenever you watch us play 4-3-3 there's no staggered line there's no
Creator 1.There's no diagonal balls, it's all straight forwards, sideways or backwards. United showed at the start of the season exactly what you can do with a fast striker and players that are capable of playing incisive, diagonal passes from deep.
2. We have neither a passer or a creator in it. In the established 4-3-3, the 2 man midfield of the 4-4-2 (creator, destroyer) is expanded with the addition of the passer. There's a lot written about this and I'm not going to bore you if you already know it (if not, just say and I'll post some links) but it's pretty clear that Ramires is more of a shuttler (endless energy, takes care of a lot of the transition between attack and defend) whilst Meireles and Lampard are both box to box types. Whenever you watch us play 4-3-3 there's no staggered line there's no
------------------------------------------------------------------Creator--------------Passer
.............................Passer-----------------Instead it's
..........Destroyer------------------------------------------------------------Destroyer
Lampard has said in the past that he's uncomfortable playing in the hole and I've never seen Meireles push up to assume that role. So we end up with this fairly tight little midfield trio and a massive gap between the Striker and the Midfield, with the result being that we're very reliant on our wide men to link up play. Ramires does offer some help in this regard but he's not got the final pass in him to really give Torres enough support. The problem with relying on your wide men was mentioned earlier- Torres needs central support much more than he needs width- but there's another issue with it aswell: we're not actually using proper wide men on either flank atm: Mata is expected to stay forward and fill the AMC slot as well as his own and Sturridge is a wide striker. The vast majority of the pressure for width is therefore placed on the FullBacks, who have both been found wanting this year. Bosingwa is, I believe, not suited to playing a complete FB role, he lacks the discipline and positional awareness to do so but Cole has been taking a lot of flak this year, most of which I think is undeserved because as I mentioned he's being asked to do a huge amount. It's no coincidence that the times where we've worked best this year have been the times in which the DM has fallen back in a CB position, effectively giving us a back 3 with 2 wingbacks, alleviating a lot of the stress on the FBs.
So, the balance of the team is pretty shot because of this fundamental issue with the midfield. With a complete forward like Drogba at the helm, a trio of destroyer, shuttle and box to box would be magic because he has the raw physicality to thrive off the supply from the flanks whilst being able to hold the ball up long enough for the box to box and shuttle to get forward. We don't have the Drogba of 5 years ago though, we have Torres, a predatory striker who excels at working the channels, slipping in through defences, dribbling his man and finishing the chance. If we want him to perform, we either need an AMC or we need a real creator to play in the middle three, someone who will push up the field.
Hopefully I've shown why his tactics are a bit haphazard (badum tsh), he's trying to force a round peg into a square hole and until we get the tools for him to work with, he can't do a great deal other than try and hold the two styles together as best as he can until the transition is over. A lot of people have called on him to abandon Torres for a while and focus on results but that's not possible either because the way we got results before can't really be returned to unless Drogba finds some hidden burst of vitality or Lukaku matures instantly (he needs 3/4 years before he can really be excellent imo)
All these players are cup tied for the CL and AVB has, quite rightly, said that whoever we buy has to be able to contribute to the CL campaign. I'd also suggest that we don't need a new first choice striker but a creative midfielder/left winger (although if you go back 15 pages or so, GC makes a good case for playing Sturridge on the left) Hazard/Di Maria on the left, Mata in the Middle or Mata on the left, Gotze in the middle would be awesome but again I can't see it until the summer (I can't see Real let Di Maria go at all tbh)
Parker is more of what we already have. Modric I don't know about, I'd like to say yes but I think the team would be more balanced in a 4-2-3-1 than a 4-3-3 and I think Modric is more suited to playing the slightly deeper creative role of the 4-3-3.
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If Torres didn't have Sturridge constantly running circles around him I think he would do a far better job, Sturridge is extremely naive tactically so you see him popping up alongside Torres in some sort of 2 man strikeforce on the shoulder that shouldn't exist in the tactic.
It's really not hard to see why the attacks are so strained and unappealing on the eye, you have Mata drifting inside to try and get the ball leaving a gap down the left wing that no one else fills; you have Sturridge ignoring his position and running defenders into the middle; Lampard starts games in the hole but ends up a lot deeper; Ramires tries driving runs but his primary duty is filling in when Sturridge or a fullback goes wandering; Meireles just isn't consistent enough and tries far too many long shots.
The options aren't there for the passer, the fullbacks most of the time lack the drive to get the right ball in, Torres never seems to be positioned well enough in the box to get goalside of his defender or get across him to put the cross away, Mata gets nothing like the amount of touches he needs to get - I suspect a miniscule amount compared to Silva at City - and Malouda played most of the game in some self-identified free role rather than playing wide left and leaving Mata to know he can stay in the middle.
Any striker in world football would struggle to score goals in that team put out yesterday, some of the levels of selfishness that were displayed by some players over the past 6 months mean it's absurd to expect 30 goal a season Torres to suddenly reappear.
People call for Drogba to come back in, he was worse than Torres and I would argue contributed a lot less to the team.
Even when Lukaku came on he had to create anything himself, the supply lines at Chelsea are abysmal and that's down to a mixture of styles that each player has had drilled into them over the years from Scolari's 'byline, byline, byline' philosophy to Hiddinks get the ball to the frontman as quick as possible.
For there to be any significant transition into the AVB style he needs to get out the Kalou's/Malouda's/Lampard's/Terry's/Drogba's/Bosingwa's and bring in his own players.
Unfortunately that's easier said than done, I'd expect the major changes to happen in the summer when a few of those mentioned contracts are up and when offloading will be more channelled and methodical.
I have to say I did expect a wide player to come in this window, clearly Kalou/Malouda offer the team nothing in the way of cover.
The main positive I'm taking from this month is Michael Essien coming back, he will be a major boost to the team and will anchor the midfield at a top class level.
Ramirez at Bologna would be up on my list for left wingers, him and Griezmann would be my priorities if we're talking about signing in this window.
As for the Cahill signing, his mobility isn't my concern it's his concentration he let's it lapse occasionally and allows people in behind him. Not an ideal centre back but looking at the market and the idea that Galliani has quoted Thiago Silva at £34 million it's not a bad deal.
I have to say I am flabbergasted that the club hasn't moved for Guarin, Porto have openly admitted for 2 months that they will listen to offers and it looks like he's talking to Inter/Juve at around £13 million which is an absolute steal.
Reports in Argentina that Chelsea's inquiry for Ocampos was met with an £8.3 million pricetag. It could be a deal that drags on a few years with some kind of first refusal, I can't see them paying that much under this regime for raw talent that would be better suited developed in Argentina for 2-3 years.
Another situation to watch could be Isaac Cuenca at Barcelona, his contracts up in the summer and there is plenty of attention on him it wouldn't surprise me if Chelsea go in for him on a pre contract along with half of Europe. He'd fit the bill as far as style of wide attacking midfielder AVB would like.
It's really not hard to see why the attacks are so strained and unappealing on the eye, you have Mata drifting inside to try and get the ball leaving a gap down the left wing that no one else fills; you have Sturridge ignoring his position and running defenders into the middle; Lampard starts games in the hole but ends up a lot deeper; Ramires tries driving runs but his primary duty is filling in when Sturridge or a fullback goes wandering; Meireles just isn't consistent enough and tries far too many long shots.
The options aren't there for the passer, the fullbacks most of the time lack the drive to get the right ball in, Torres never seems to be positioned well enough in the box to get goalside of his defender or get across him to put the cross away, Mata gets nothing like the amount of touches he needs to get - I suspect a miniscule amount compared to Silva at City - and Malouda played most of the game in some self-identified free role rather than playing wide left and leaving Mata to know he can stay in the middle.
Any striker in world football would struggle to score goals in that team put out yesterday, some of the levels of selfishness that were displayed by some players over the past 6 months mean it's absurd to expect 30 goal a season Torres to suddenly reappear.
People call for Drogba to come back in, he was worse than Torres and I would argue contributed a lot less to the team.
Even when Lukaku came on he had to create anything himself, the supply lines at Chelsea are abysmal and that's down to a mixture of styles that each player has had drilled into them over the years from Scolari's 'byline, byline, byline' philosophy to Hiddinks get the ball to the frontman as quick as possible.
For there to be any significant transition into the AVB style he needs to get out the Kalou's/Malouda's/Lampard's/Terry's/Drogba's/Bosingwa's and bring in his own players.
Unfortunately that's easier said than done, I'd expect the major changes to happen in the summer when a few of those mentioned contracts are up and when offloading will be more channelled and methodical.
I have to say I did expect a wide player to come in this window, clearly Kalou/Malouda offer the team nothing in the way of cover.
The main positive I'm taking from this month is Michael Essien coming back, he will be a major boost to the team and will anchor the midfield at a top class level.
Ramirez at Bologna would be up on my list for left wingers, him and Griezmann would be my priorities if we're talking about signing in this window.
As for the Cahill signing, his mobility isn't my concern it's his concentration he let's it lapse occasionally and allows people in behind him. Not an ideal centre back but looking at the market and the idea that Galliani has quoted Thiago Silva at £34 million it's not a bad deal.
I have to say I am flabbergasted that the club hasn't moved for Guarin, Porto have openly admitted for 2 months that they will listen to offers and it looks like he's talking to Inter/Juve at around £13 million which is an absolute steal.
Reports in Argentina that Chelsea's inquiry for Ocampos was met with an £8.3 million pricetag. It could be a deal that drags on a few years with some kind of first refusal, I can't see them paying that much under this regime for raw talent that would be better suited developed in Argentina for 2-3 years.
Another situation to watch could be Isaac Cuenca at Barcelona, his contracts up in the summer and there is plenty of attention on him it wouldn't surprise me if Chelsea go in for him on a pre contract along with half of Europe. He'd fit the bill as far as style of wide attacking midfielder AVB would like.
Really? You do realise that'll likely cost something north of £150 million, right? Quite apart from that, Gotze will be horrifically expensive and likely destined for a Spanish giant, Hazard would be high-profile and well tracked by other clubs of similar stature. Cavani? Possible, but I don't think he'll be leaving Napoli any time soon. Di Maria has been one of Madrid's best players this season, and he's at one of the two biggest clubs in the world, on a fat contract: why would he leave? As for Parker, he's getting on and both he and Modric are doing brilliantly at Spurs, who in turn are doing better than Chelsea this year.
I agree with everything else, but this is way wrong - Di Maria has one of the lowest salaries in the Madrid squad, and the lowest in their starting XI - Around 1.5m euros per year. As a matter of fact Di Maria asked for a raise (As a comparison, Kaká, who has been **** ever since moving to Madrid is earning well over 10m euros per year), a move Mourinho supports, but so far no new contract. He could probably be tempted to move if Roman's willing to add some rubles to his bank account.
Interesting. Wasn't aware of that, I just assumed following his move his contract would've been a pretty big one.
I can't believe that no one else has mentioned this. How many timesthis season have we seen Torres moving with purpose towards the rightchannel only to find Sturridge running into it?
I think that the fullbacks forget that the can pass or cross from deep,they don't seem happy unless they're running all the way to cornerflag and putting a cross into an overcrowded box. It would give us alot more options if they pulled the ball back sometimes.
I think that with Sturridge encroaching on his space and the massivehole behind him, it's understandable. I'm not making excuses for him,he needs to get that killer instinct back and start putting himselfin great positions, but he's quite often foiled by his team-mate'sgreed/inability to produce a good pass quick enough. The whole thingwas epitomised in the game against Newcastle(?) when Sturridge wascutting inside from a narrow angle, had ****** all chance of scoringwith a defender closing him and Torres in space and at a better angleyet Sturridge chose the pot shot.
I smiled at this, only because I happened to notice earlier that Silva and Mata had exactly the same amount of touches (89) in this weekend's games. I totally agree withyou and that little stat is a misleading because A) Mata gets a lotmore touches in less threatening positions because he's constantlyhaving to move to give his team-mates options B) If we look at bothclubs vs Spurs, Mata was quiet and had 60 touchs, Silva was arguablyMotM and had one and half times as many touchs with 89.
I still think he should be credited with perfecting the role of playstagnator...
Lukaku also needs time to develop his technical side. People forget that Drogba wasn't just a fast battering ram, he had a nice touch on himand he could do a bit of everything. In Belgium, Lukaku was pushed toincrease his power, aerial ability, and finishing, all greatattributes but if he's left that way he risks becoming the striking equivalent of Mikel. (on the note of Mikel, I honestly think he couldbe a great player again but he needs to a team that can play him in aless defensive role and take the fact that he will need at least aseason to undo the restrictions we've put on him)
I'd still love a central playmaker and Mata to stay wide but to be quitehonest I'd take anyone at this point.
Stop it Jamie, if you keep that kind of talk up I'll need fresh underwear!
Silva and Luiz together would be unbelievable, these days a lot ofthe partnerships in football are being broken down to suit the teamethic or expanded in a trio but it's still great to watch a trulyspecial pairing where two players compliment each perfectly. For meLuiz and Silva have the potential to be that for Brazil and theprospect of having that at Chelsea (as well as a 27yr old, worldclass defender) is just too good. On Cahill, I think he's a decentplayer but for me his wages are far too much and I can't see himpartnering Luiz because of the concentration issue you mentioned.Ideally if you're building a trio of first team Cbs you want thequick one, the strong one and the clever one because they each covereach other's faults and allow you to customise your pairing dependingon the opponent. I'm hoping it means we have something bigger in the pipeline. If not, Idon't understand why we'd not get him for that price. I guess AVB mayalso have issues with him we don't know about, given that he'sobviously managed him before.
Both of them look like great prospects but we need to fill that void in the first teambefore anything else. A new right back is a must too.
@GC I don't think he meant all of them. I'm with you on Di Maria though, he's been immense all year and he will definitely be retained. I can maybe see Ozilgoing in the summer if things don't pick back up for him, but eventhat seems unlikely.
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