Beerqueen

Marcel Desailly‏Verified account @marceldesailly 3h3 hours ago More 71% of the earth is covered by water. The remaining 29% is covered by N'Golo Kanté @ChelseaFC Hahahahahahha

But Europa is different - he wouldn't be banned for that would he, like Ibrahimovitch wasn't.

Bloody hope so - was just wondering when it usually comes - it's usually Monday afternoon from the weekend isn't it?

That's right - we were debating last night whether it was actually in the rules that a ref could take it into account and all agreed it should be - we've all seen these games (often involving Haz) where players just spread the fouling out amongst themselves to protect the team from reds. It didn't work this time and good on Michael Oliver for getting that right anyway even if he missed about 5 other possible yellows.

Interesting from WAGNH: The guideline comes from the US Soccer Federation’s “Advice to Referees”, which is an official publication to help interpret FIFA’s rules. While these obviously aren’t FA or PGMOL publications, the laws of the game and the guidelines for applying the laws of the game should be universal. (That’s part of the mandate of FIFA) " The referee must also recognize when a single opponent has become the target of fouls by multiple players. As above, upon recognizing the pattern, the referee should clearly indicate that the pattern has been observed and that further fouls against this opponent must cease. If another player commits a foul against the targeted opponent, that player must be cautioned but, in this case, the misconduct should be reported as unsporting behavior, as must any subsequent caution of any further foul against that same targeted opponent. Eventually, the team will get the message. "

Apart from Costa who was at his worst admittedly, we were absolute angels! Fouls given are 14 against them, 7 to us. I must admit I thought there were probably more than that on Hazard alone in the first 20 minutes!

The irony! Oh Jose......... https://www.theguardian.com/football/2015/jan/01/jose-mourinho-referee-phil-dowd-eden-hazard-chelsea-tottenham “If people are in love with football in this country then they must be in love with Eden Hazard. But the way, match to match, he’s being punished by opponents and not protected by referees … maybe one day we won’t have Eden Hazard. It’s one, two, three, four, five, 10 aggressive fouls against him. They kick and kick and kick, and the kid resists. He’s a very honest guy in the way he plays but that’s another problem.”

What match were they watching cos it sure as hell wasn't the same as the one I saw! Man-marking now means hacking down at every opportunity? And what about Rojo? I don't watch that much of Manure but even I know that's the third red he should've got this season and he didn't even get a yellow.

We didn't "rely" on a red card - it happened because they were fouling all night. What were we meant to do? Say, "oh actually, let him stay on the pitch as it will be so much more interesting having 11 v 11 and we won't feel we've won properly if we only beat 10". It's what happens and is part of the rules - you play dirty, you (should) pay the price. It would be fairer to say, they "relied" on fouling Hazard to stop him. And it failed.

Good old BBC - our best player last night was apparently one who hasn't played for us for seven years: The praise was raining down on Claude Makelele last night from ever conceivable angle. He was terrific, scoring the winner as Chelsea beat Manchester United while covering every blade of grass.

Bournemouth 1-1 West Ham Everton 2-0 West Brom Hull 1-0 Swansea Aston Villa 1-1 Sheff Wed Leeds 2-0 QPR Preston 1-1 Reading

Apparently he said "‘I think Conte’s cupboard is full, that’s why they decided to give it to someone else,’ ‘ http://metro.co.uk/2017/03/10/pep-guardiola-claims-antonio-conte-is-behind-his-premier-league-manager-of-the-month-award-win-6501537/#ixzz4axH3evcB

Of course! How could I have forgotten! Well, he obviously deserves it then. Hell, let's give him Manager of the Year too while we're at it!

Because we've got such a wonderful record of signing cracking strikers recently haven't we? They are just all over the place, merely for the asking.

Pep? Really? What did he do in February? Oh apparently he won three out of three - against West Ham, Swansea and Bournemouth - whoopie do!

That would be a bit too nervy for me! And I can't decide whether it would be funnier if Arsenal or Manure fail to qualify for Europe. I hope they both fail to get into the CL but that would mean Liverpool are there..... Unless Everton put on a spurt I suppose! Yep that would be best.

I love him. I appreciate what he did here. But I still want to beat him, no correct that, smash him to smithereens. More so because he is now Manure. If he had gone to some European club that we happened to draw (obviously not this year due to him ) I wouldn't care nearly so much. But, it's Manure.... and he is being a bit of a pain.....

No idea if this is true but thought I'd share it anyway just for the laughs: #CarefreeDaily @CarefreeDaily 9h9 hours ago More Alexis Sanchez's agent Fernando Felicevich had lunch with Marina Granovasksia at London's Dorchester hotel. Interesting.

Sorry I've taken this thread a bit off-topic - I don't know if you realise @TheChelseaBluesthat this isn't the game! I was just musing that I quite liked doing this at this time of the year. Who is going to guide us to the format we need to do the Shed-End Last XI - or is it literally just listing our fixtures and predicting the scores?

ITV saying Suarez should have been sent off for a second dive.

Yeah all three north-eastern teams relegated!

Thanks Coco - surprisingly, according to me, Liverpool make the CL, MU get Europa and Arsenal miss out. league table.docx

So we've got until a week on Saturday to put our predictions in? @Butchcome on - we need you! On a slightly different note, I miss the BBC prediction thing where you used to be able to put in all your predictions for all the remaining games and it would work out the final league table. Does anyone know if anywhere else does that?

Bollocks! That's why Liverpool was on a Friday night - so that all the Scousers had a nice easy journey down to London and the chance to spend the night in London as the last train left before the match finished. And that's just off the top of my head!

Stoke got a point at Old Trafford and at home to Manure as well. But tbf they've also lost some matches which you would've thought they should have got something out of. So I don't really expect much from them tonight. And yeah, Stoke is a sh*t-hole. But within an hour you could be in Shropshire!