Slojo

Jones & Smalling are both a pair of dirty bastards and get away with murder. They're British, so it's obvious they'll only have positive spotlight during the analysis & post game.

And even then Essien after those two injuries was a better player. How I miss some of the old guard! Especially Essien when we first signed him.

I think everyone in the world expected this outcome.

That not being a red card is utterly atrocious and if that comes back to f**king bite us because Oliver is a spineless little pea head I swear to god. The decisions that go United's way it's like no other.

Leaving Willian out for Bakayoko... Really?? What an absolute sh*t house of a lineup, the 3-5-2 again. Go back to the 3-4-3 Conte! We need to win this and inspire some positivity.

Well, I've never denied that, I even said RLC was held back by Conte and Mourinho both. But I see a lot of delusion on here when people think the lad should be a starter next season, he isn't ready yet. But he can definitely come here and play more games but he'll have to be subjected to less game time than he got at Palace. I think that's fairly reasonable I don't know about you. RLC has played for Palace and in the PL and he's done well overall, I think that itself is more proven than getting someone like Bakayoko from Ligue 1. I'm not sure if anyone watched any Monaco games in the Champions League but my god was Bakayoko poor in those games, it's why I was never keen on the idea of getting him in the first place. Reviews about him from Monaco fans were very hit and miss, so I think it's equally just as a gamble here or maybe, even more, I'm not sure. But as for the big stage I don't think you can class Ligue 1 as the big stage, Champions League yes, and whenever he performed in the Champions League he was piss poor.

He was 22 when we signed him, RLC is 22 now, it's practically the same thing. From the get go he was a huge gamble, one good season, untested, hit and miss fan reviews from him. RLC is also a big gamble (if for example we went with him to be our main starter next season and we didn't sign anybody else to be in front of him).

You could say the same for Bakayoko, look how that turned out. You don't just drop unproven youngsters in the deep end.

Harsh but needed to be said, I think people got carried away with him. I've watched him and I've seen inconsistency, I'm very proud of him that he's got in the World Cup but that doesn't guarantee he's good enough to be the man we need at Chelsea. We need a world class midfielder to do the job, is RLC world class? No, will he be one day? Maybe, debatable. Like Argo said, he's still massively untested, especially in the physical and work rate department. He's no doubt got lots of flair and looks like he can really improve his game, he's good at going forward and thinking quickly for such a big guy who's less agile than others. But we can't afford to put all our eggs in one basket here, not again, we did it with Bakayoko it hasn't worked and it's definitely cost us a lot of points. Now we are outside the top 4 and aren't looking very good before our FA Cup final. Let's get real here, RLC isn't ready to start, is he ready to get more games here? Absolutely, but he's not the man to play next to Kante next season, we need to sell players and get some new ones in.

Southgate has done more for RLC than Conte & Jose combined, bit odd that isn't it. But definitely, I dislike Southgate as a manager but he's definitely given a lot of youth a chance, something Hodgson and Capello were afraid to do.

The helmet line had me crying. But it is amazing how one keeps constantly contradicting himself around the forum while being randomly aggressive towards others and players then plays the victim card innit?

There is truly nothing better than a yorkleyblue vs Didierforever argument

Is he still the same now? I thought he would've got out of that childish attitude years ago, he always had potential when he was a youngster in that Liverpool squad. It was his silly attitude that let him down.

It's funny how a player we spent over 30 million on hasn't gone to the World Cup but a player we sent out on loan has set out performed well and got himself on the plane. You couldn't make it up could you, somebody up in that technical room needs sacking.

Cahill & Welbeck shouldn't be anywhere near that squad, and I'm very surprised Jonjo Shelvey didn't make it he has been outstanding this season. Considering we've got no good passers or technical players in midfield, just speed merchants that play up top, we could have really done with a player like Shelvey there. Then again why am I bothered, lost my passion for England years ago.

And he was in another 30 plus games were he performed terribly in. If Bakayoko is starting, I'm very worried I have to be honest, but at the same time who else is there to play?

Sometimes I think if Terry was still here in the dressing room he could have had an impact, Aston Villa are going up this season and the Villa fans already love him. Terry was a powerful character and his influence grew with age and experience, right now we have nobody like that but Cahill, Kante and Hazard.

I've never been so unconfident for a cup final before in my whole life, I'm sorry to be negative and sh*t on the parade here but it's just how I feel. I'm usually very confident and have a belief but this team has no leadership, they seem half-arsed, Conte's cup final record is atrocious also, especially in comparison to Mourinho's.

Both Let's just pretend we never went on TalkChelsea yeah.

I'm really confused...

His build-up play was good first half of the season, much better than Costa's (although not saying much), but it's his finishing that's truly abysmal. I thought Sky Sports did an excellent assessment of our finishing woes this season and Morata. I'm sure you've read it you posted the stats earlier I believe? Morata's conversion rate is atrocious in comparison to all the other strikers in the top 6.

Excellent post you just about summed everything up. I worry at how late we are leaving everything in the market these days, Pep had all his players signed early and won the league, is it any coincidence that signing your players earlier guarantees better success? When we first signed Pedro it took him a while to settle, maybe if we didn't sign him last minute like we did he would have had a better season in his first season. Ultimately I think we are paying the price of going after too many bargains and penny-pinching. However, the main question is, who's mainly at fault? I do think that's important. Because Emenalo is no longer here, Conte is allegedly not signing some of these players, what's going on? I think Conte having another season here won't help, but who am I to say that? If we get another manager we could end up in the exact same cycle over and over again and nothing will change.

He was actually good against Liverpool, his best games for me were Atletico away and Huddersfield away. But that's the type of stuff Kante does every single game even when the team are bad, so it's like we've accepted mediocrity and gone "Eh yeah that's alright, that's better, very good"... Meanwhile, the other scapegoats on the forum get blasted even when they haven't played a game.

My wording wasn’t the best but yes that’s what I meant. Plus I was pretty pissed off by the time I was writing that just after the match. This season has been horrible. Also the reason why I put that, regarding morons, is because some people who constantly slate the manager and a certain number of our players, constantly praise Bakayoko for having a poor game. It's got the point where people will praise Bakayoko (they probably played with him on FIFA or something before he came so they've always liked the idea of him) when he does nothing. Swansea, Southampton, Burnley he was poor in every one of those games. Those were the games I meant.

That’s not what I said, I said the 3 games before the Liverpool match. Not any 3 games. He was praised since coming back into the startup in the last 5 PL games he’s started in a row. Yet he’s had 1 good game out of that 5. I literally pointed out 5 good games he’s had this season in the Morata thread and in this one, why would I go out and say he’s only had 1 good game?