dustbin00

I agree about the Cahill point you make Mikel has offered no protection for our defense today. He allowed the likes of Silva, Milner and Toure wayy too much time to pick out passes. Would argue that Cahill has done quite well given the Mikel disappearing act. For a team that plays with 2 DMs, our midfield pressing was shocking

Ivanovic with some lazy, lazy defending

Mikel with some atrocious defending...let Toure walk right past him There was a chance earlier when Aguero chipped Cech.....Mikel allowed Milner way too much time on the ball in the middle of the pitch He did make a terrific tackle on Tevez prior to the goal but he's still killing us, Get him off NOW

A tactical breakdown provided by ZonalMarking. Seems like most tactical changes thus far have been very subtle, very interesting read. http://www.zonalmarking.net/2011/08/14/stoke-0-0-chelsea-villas-boas-tactics/

Good to know that he was well loved by City supporters :D I think he's the only Chinese player to have had relative success in the Premiership. Yes he's back in China now, plaid for Sheff Utd last year but after more injuries, didn't really settle. He might've been loaned off to Sheff Utd's China affiliate the Chengdu Blades, but I'm not quite sure. Really liked him as a player though, somewhat like Belletti last season!

Hey Bluemoon, apologies for going off topic a bit, but was wondering what you thought of Sun Jihai when he played for you guys a few years ago? Always loved him as I am Chinese myself and it was heart wrenching for me when our own Eidur Gudjohnsen pretty much injured him for good. Thought he always gave his all on the pitch, but never knew what City fans thought of him. Cheers!

I really don't understand why Buck is so eager to tip his hand about our transfer spending. Certainly all our transfer targets just went up in price by at least 20-30% after this statement? Makes no business sense whatsoever. I know we won't be fooling anyone if we say that we have a limited budget of $30 Million or something, but can we at least be a little more discrete about how much we're willing to spend? I just don't see the positives of saying something like this.

Absolute class act and someone that every young manager should look up to. Whoever is next will have a tough, tough act to follow.

4.) If Drogba stays, must have enough ego-managing capabilities to get the best out of him

I think that's the sensible thing to do, but in my heart I'm hoping we'll take the game to Barca right from the start! Either way, have to be happy with how Drogba/Anelka/Malouda combined for the goals today.

Perhaps this is a trial run for both Anelka and Drogba to start against Barca?

Well...Looks like they've picked a complete tw*t as their Chelsea correspondent.......... http://blogs.soccernet.com/chelsea/archive..._silverwear.php Sometimes, you have to wonder why the media hates us so much. It's all thanks to these brainless idiots that call themselves Chelsea fans. Does all of us proud Sure hope it's not someone from here

I think you have competition for Frankie's heart though Gem!

WHEW......we're through, that's all that matters. Fantastic spirit shown by everyone tonight. Teetering on the edge of elimination, we dug deep and got a result...when it comes down to the line, we showed the world tonight that we are made of sterner stuff! BRING ON BARCA!!!!!

What...the....F*CK

What a goal....YESSS!!!! Cole just got booked though.....misses next game...if there is one

GOAL....a much needed breath of air for us

This team had better get the hair blower treatment from Hiddink...utter Sh*te

13.) For scoring from a virtually impossible angle... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYTJpVvAGRs

Well after reading the soccernet match report (you can see i get all my news from soccernet), seems like Deco was the one that cleared Cahill's shot off the line. So...credit where it's due, he saved our 3 pts there. He was pretty awful everywhere else though. As for Mikel, I know he has his supporters but I really can't see the positives of playing him in the Maka role. He has a great physique and at times, uses that well to shield the ball and keep possession, but that's about it. His tackling isn't anything special and he's always prone to giving up stupid fouls around the penalty area. As for his marking and positional awareness, I found that today he failed on a number of occasions to pick up the trailing or late-arriving midfielder, allowing Davies to play them in with his flick-ons. Another one of his mistakes gifted a chance to Davies just before the HT whistle, and thankfully, Davies hit it over. All of Mikel's mistakes seem to stem from a lack of mental focus as opposed to losing out physically. This gives me hope that he is far from the finished product at the moment...but today, I felt he was awful.

Carvalho looked as if he had no idea how to deal with Davies, I'm worried if he can shake the rust off in time for Liverpool Mikel, plain and simple, is not a defensive midfielder. His decision making is highly, highly questionable when put under pressure.

Didn't see much of the first half so can't comment....was stuck on soccernet gamecast lol That said, our midfield without either Lamps or Essien has no bite whatsoever. Davies has given us tonnes of problems in the air, let's hope Liverscum don't use the same tactic against Riccy with Torres. FT...whew, we were let off the hook there by Cahill

We lost the midfield once Deco came on....

Oh my goodness...have to dig deep now.....much too complacent and we're paying heavily for it

replays showing O'Brien was offside...Cech should've dealt with it though EDIT: Christ, we're collapsing at the back now