Van Butsen

His instagram now says it's been a tough year but 'we will bounce back next year' Take from that what you will

At the time of appointment we were under serious threat of being relegated. I think Guus and Capello are fairly like-for-like and the fact Guus came in an went on the longest undefeated run this season justifies that decision. Clement, Zola and Clarke, whilst these choices may have brought some fresh ideas to the table and boosted morale.. it would be hard to justify any of their appointments if they weren't able to arrest the slide and that was the number 1 priority. I think they would have been highly risky choices. To your point about not moving forward I think you're being fairly hush. Going back to Mourinho was a success, we won the premiership. Just because it's 'going back' doesn't always make it the wrong decision and many suggested removing Mourinho the first time was the wrong decisions. is it possible the club can make some wrong choices and amend them? The club have made some big decisions moving forward about building a larger stadium, signalling their intent to continue to grow and invest in the football department as well as the youth academy development in order to (ideally) replace large portions of transfer market spending. it's all a learning game and I don't see any clubs make bold 'for the future' type decisions that dwarf ours.

I was never talking about the minutes of particular players, all i said was almost all improved under him and I stand by that. Just because you go ultra defensive doesn't make it easier. I agree with your points about the young players, I never said anything of the contrary.

It's actually not that hard. To my first point, you just get a list of every Chelsea manager still alive, managing (could be poached, so doesn't have to be out of work) and compare their records with each other. Guss wins To my second point, and this is a little harder but not so hard that you can't have an educated guess if you are interested in football. Take a list of the best leagues in Europe. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UEFA_coefficient(I use this because as far back as I can remember our manager has come from Europe, safe bet?) (Edit european clubs, not of European descent) Take the top 20 leagues, (Same reason as above) Take managers who are still alive and managing or have managed in those leagues. Make an assumption about their will to work for only 6 months. Find the most successful, affordable, singable manager in that list. But you can do all that far quicker by scanning the top leagues and just using your brain. There are really only a handful of world class managers, it's really not hard to suggest he was the best fit.

If they hadn't improved we'd be down with Villa (or close to it). There was obvious improvement, as the table suggests. You seem to be ranting and raving about RLC or management/substitutions decisions that can be explained 100's of ways, just not the ways you like.

Yeah as I said.. actually it wasn't literal enough so I'll spell it out for you here. By the time managers finish their careers, 99% of them will have had losses, home losses, even bad losses (the 4,5,6 - 0 types) and even losses against smaller teams (faroe island) At the time of the appointment there were 0 managers available that had a better record managing Chelsea (that's a good start) and probably 0 who had a better career who would be willing to come in for a short stint. He'd won cups with big teams and he'd taken smaller teams to great heights. Not always, but he had done it.

A poor appointment by the club? They'd just sacked the clubs favourite manager and appointed a well liked, well respected and winning manager. Brought in someone with a better record? Of all the coaches available for what was only going to be short stint, his record blew everyone else away. Can't complain about the draws, in the first half of the season they were losses. Thought he did a good job and almost every single player improved under him, saving us some decisions this summer. Thanks Guus, hope you do stick around, it's important to have great people like you at the club.

Got picked in the provisional Eng squad, with only two other central defenders (Smalling, Stones). I'd say it's him and Smalling for the tournament then.. I've never thought he was an outstanding player but if he has a good few games for England it can can only help his confidence coming into next season.

I wonder how clubs who don't have CL ever sign anyone

Can't argue much with the original poster. They can all improve which is a positive for next year

For anyone not on Insta

Agreed

Yeah i think the majority of posters are being quite harsh on the club but that may just be me. They have been getting stick for taking so long to offer one and now also getting stick for announcing they've offered one. Can they do anything right? JT has said that he wants to finish his career at Chelsea. But having now fielded offers from abroad and from Chelsea, like any human would do, he may actually have a different opinion. The ball is entirely in his court now.

Is Miazga injured or what's going on? Iforgot about him while the Liverpool game was on and only just realised we did have another CB option

I actually wouldn't mind seeing Amelia play

Yep, he's a sharp operator, something big on the cards... http://www.skysports.com/football/news/11661/10279992/chelsea-sell-more-shirts-than-manchester-united-in-2015-16

Happily take top 4? Like that is a given ? If we were lucky enough to have two youth players cement themselves in the senior squad and finish 4th that would be an outstanding year in my books. It is no where near as easy or simple as that. Not that I don't feel similiar to you, but aren't you just saying you'd like to see the club become an academy club? Producing quality youth who push onto the senior side but who never actually contend for silverware?

Generally I laugh off any insult directed at me for being Chelsea fan, mostly because it's true and sometimes you have to love who you are.. but the "no history" line, especially from Scousers, really grinds my gears

It's pretty odd that there hasn't been an announcement, no matter what the decision is. Conte's job has already begun regardless of the Euros, this season would prove that, he'll need to be looking at the current players as early as possible, looking at other players who can bolster the squad looking at where he can fill gaps with youth. These decisions need to be made earlier rather than later, otherwise you end up looking at your CB choices and think sh*t.. who have Reading got in that area. I think a decision has been made, it has to have been. If they didn't want him to stay, they would have made the announcement. i think the coach wants him to stay, and the club are happy with this but are insisting on the wages being reduced. John hasn't openly said he'd take a pay cut.. he's only said that he wants to stay on. Not that i think he has to or is it the right thing to do, but why wouldn't he come out say something along the lines of "I just want to play for Chelsea, and I'd be happy to do so on reduced wages"? That would really put the club on notice.

We actually drop 2 points without Pedro for the WBA game. He scored the first against Bournemouth to set the tone.. A team who beat us at home. His first against Newcastle was inside 10 minutes, also setting the tone against a team we drew with earlier in the season. A goal against Sunderland, who just beat us. You may laugh at the quality of opposition, but we weren't so far off those other teams this year with the exception of Villa.

I guess will have to disagree on what we think's constitutes a leader or how they are made/born. Why are those three leaders in your eyes? What do they have that the players I mentioned don't? it can't be because they have won everything at this club because there'd simply be no leaders at a lot of clubs. More leadership would not have got us 4th or passed Paris this year

What on earth, I simply can't believe people agree with this. If it's so simple they should all get together this off season and decide to win the premier league next year by playing 38 games in swashbuckling form.

Imagine being so good that you could just turn your form on and off like that

Can't agree with either of you I'm afraid. I for one did not want to see us lose last night so I'm very happy Gus decided to secure a point. Imagine if we'd conceded again in the last minute and lost, would have been devastating in my eyes. Not saying RLC was the difference at the end, but that's why the change was made. I struggle to see what would make either of you happy. There was a start for a young striker, a start for a left footed full back, a substitute appearance for a 20 year old with plenty of time on the clock and a debut for a promising 18 year old. As I mentioned in my earlier post there are so many reasons why Matic/Mikel have been preferred lately so its not inexplicable at all. I for one think the only question mark over last nights side would be to play an out of position midfielder in defense when there was an opportunity for a youth player to play in his rightful position.

It's easy to act like the club have easy decisions, with a fan base demanding success but also demanding the youth be blooded whilst not wanting to be beaten by a rival. We can't go an put 11 youths on the park, I struggle to see how having more than 3 would be beneficial to any of them really. Maybe he would have been a better option than Matic for developments sake last night from the beginning, but you have to remember we now have a new manager on board with some tough decisions to make and needs to be certain players like Matic are just having a blip. But then again, we were down on centre halfs last night so having a more senior midfield duo would probably help Mikel so that we didn't lose to a rival and give the fans another reason to be unhappy. The reasoning is endless, the club can hardly have a problem with development.. they've pumped more money into development than any other club. i thought we were terrific last night.