Taipan

Has to be Cucurella for me. Pocketing the (nearly) ballon d'or winner.

Nkunku not in the squad. I think he's played his last game for us.

To pick the team for every conference league game this season the first step should be to pick the starting 11 for the following weekend premier league game first. Then none of those players should be in the midweek conference league game preceding it. Then pick the team from the remaining available squad, with debate around how involved the bench players from the weekend game can be in the conference league game.

That is worthy of a thread of its own. Starting with the injuries to Chilwell and James. Surely those were mismanaged. Then you've got the injuries to Lavia, Nkunku and Chukwuemeka. Seemingly minor injuries at the time, but they've been out for 5-6 months. WTF. Give them another month and they could have about recovered from a full knee reconstruction in that time. Questions need to be asked!

I came across this YouTube video: "What the hell is happening to Saul Niguez?" It is four months old, so posted before the current speculation, and discusses his rise and fall. Losing possession 26 times and conceding a penalty in one game last season doesn't sound good.

I liked Moses in his season with us. He was behind Mata, Oscar and Hazard for a starting place in the attacking three. Those three are considerably better footballers than he is, but I also though Moses brought a lot to the team in his own way. He was more athletic – bigger, stronger and faster – certainly than Mata and Oscar, and that gave us more threat on the break. I also recall him being decent at winning headers and getting a few headed goals for us, which is quite a different threat to our starting front three – then and now. But I think we have more athleticism in our team now than we did last time he played with us. Willian is probably a better athlete than Moses and is a much better footballer. With Willian and Hazard in the team now I don’t feel that we’re lacking pace in the attacking three the way we did three years ago. If we were to bring Moses on for the last half hour in a game now I don’t think he would be bringing a much needed injection of pace the way he did last time. We’d likely be replacing pace with pace now. Maybe we’d get a fresh pair of legs and an improved ability at contesting headers, but he’d be less capable with the ball at his feet than whoever he replaced. I’m open to a return for him, especially as a home grown player. I just think as a squad we’re much better covered for the things that Moses brings than we were last time.

Crespo was class for us. In his first season when Henry was at his peak and playing up front for a top Arsenal team, Crespo scored at a significantly better goals per minute played rate than Henry (not counting Henry's penalties). In his second stint with us his contribution as a support striker to Drogba, usually from the bench, was everything you could hope for from someone in his position. The only issue with Crespo at Chelsea was that he didn't play enough. In his first stint that was down to injury (or a rumoured falling out with Ranieri). In his second stint that was down to Didier Drogba tearing apart premiership defences week after week. But anytime he set food on a pitch for us he was absolute class.

I'll be there. I'm travelling interstate to get there. :-)

If he didn't qualify as a home grown player I'd probably say he is a good player but we should be able to do better. But he does qualify as home grown and that is a big deal. He might not be Pogba or Fabregas, but those who are quick to dismiss him could stick their necks out and offer their alternatives for a home grown place in our squad. He is miles ahead of Chalobah or Loftus-Cheek and maybe winding down to 12 months remaining on his contract might not be too expensive. Definite maybe for me. :-)

Dave for me. Won every challenge. Nullified their main attacking player and had a big part in the stopping the service to Carroll. Matic close second.

Marin? Moses? Romeu? Kakuta? Torres?

Star has got a consistent and proven record of insider knowledge. I first saw it first when he posted "Expect big things from Moscow" and a few days later we signed the 6'5" Jarosik from CSKA - something that nobody saw coming. When was that - 2005? At that time his track record was already well proven by what other posters were saying, and I've seen him deliver many times since then. He's the one poster on this forum who I pay closest attention to when he posts. Star has his proven sources, and he has his own footballing opinions. If there is a fair criticism of his posts it is that it isn't always obvious which one he is posting. Read the OP in the thread you linked to: He is obviously giving his opinion on who we should sign - something we all do here. He is saying 'I believe...' and 'I continue to believe...' and 'I cannot believe...' when talking about the merits of the players he is talking about. He doesn't say anywhere that Chelsea are going to sign any of them. His one claim of inside knowledge is that post was that Zouma will become a really good player. Sadly, he hardly ever posts anymore and the forum is worse off because of it. He started getting a lot of abuse when he posted from a bunch of Johnny-come-latelys who hadn't seen his 10+ year track record of results.

Given the lack of match fitness for Schurrle, Oscar, Ramires and Hazard I wonder if Fabregas might be pushed forward and play as one of the front 3 behind Costa, and MVG might get a start next to Matic. Costa Salah Fabregas Torres Matic MVG Luis Cahill Terry Dave Cech Schurrle, Oscar and Hazard to come on for the last 30 for Salah, Torres and MVG.

I think bjd is very close with his team. The only selection I question is Luiz. If he were injured there is nobody to play in midfield alongside Ramires against Athletico. Chance of injury aside - there is still a strong case to keep him fresh for Athletico. I suspect that Jose may keep him in reserve. Perhaps Ivanovic to play in the centre, cole at LB and Dave at RB. Outside chance for Kalas to start. Having all of our starting midfielders and attackers for Athletico rested against Liverpool should be a fair advantage for us. We can still have a competitive team against Liverpool if just the defenders backup for both games.

I think one area where we have a significant advantage is in how fresh our squad will be compared to theirs. It has been shown that having only two days recovery between games significantly affects performance. Okay, both teams will have the same recovery time between games leading up to this one. But they'll probably be playing the same 11. We'll probably be bringing in five fresh players, possibly six: We'll see Dave in for Cole, Cahill for Luiz, Lampard for Ramirez, Willian for Mata and Torres for Eto and an outside chance for Schurrle to start as well. That will be a significant advantage going into the last half hour. Add to that the extra options we have from the bench I will be quietly optimistic if we get to 60 minutes with the game still in the balance.

They sold us Veron.

He's the best poster on this forum. He's the one person who I'll do a search on to see if he's posted anything recently. I'm, happy for him to start a new topic because it will be the first one that I read. He's got his source with a proven track record of inside knowledge, and he'd got his own opinion. The trick in reading his posts is knowing which one of those he is posting. I've been following his posts closely since he showed advanced knowledge of the signing of Jiri Jarosik in 2005 - something that nobody else saw coming. Star - please ignore this rif-raf and keep posting.

Those reports that he wants first team football might be true. I don't know, I don't have any inside information. It is just that I don't automatically believe everything I read, particularly when there are no direct quotes attributed to him. Signing for us could have some attractions for him: He's available on a free so he could negotiate relatively higher wages. He wouldn't need to move house to relocate from Fulham to Stamford Bridge. He could possibly extend his career by not having to back and play one or two games a week, and he could compete for major trophies. All I'm saying is that I think we should make him an offer. If he doesn't take it then that is fine, we move on.

For a backup keeper, I could put up with a huge, huge disaster like Friedel at Spurs, or Schwarzer at Fulham, or Van Der Sar at United a few seasons ago. They've proved that older keepers can perform at the highest level. Seriously though, if they're young and really good they are not going to want to sit on the bench. We saw that last summer with Buckland. I still have Schwarzer as my preferred choice. I've seen those reports saying he wants to be guaranteed first team football, but I am not convinced they are true. He's out of contract and we should make him an offer. I also agree that Al-Habsi would be a good option. Give the third place to a youth player.

With Hilario and Turnbull set to leave, and Courtois too good to come and sit on the bench we are going to need one, or even two backup keepers. Who should we bring in? We tried and failed to sign Jack Buckland last summer. He opted for more playing time elsewhere, which is entirely understandable for a promising 20 year old. I'd suggest we should go for an older and experienced keeper who is more likely to be content with limited game time, but who can be relied upon if needed. I give my vote to Mark Schwarzer if we could get him on acceptable terms. He's out of contract and maybe looking for a change. http://espnfc.com/news/story/_/id/1456290/schwarzer-considering-fulham-exit?cc=3436 Definately work an offer in my opinion, if he could accept limited starts.

We should not even think about playing Hazard. Yes it is a final, but it is one game. Liverpool wrecked Torres by not managing his injuries properly. Lets not make the same mistake with Hazard.

I want us to win every game we play. That said, doing well in the EL is worth nothing if we can't qualify for the Champions League for next season. We must give priority to the league. We must give priority to beating Swansea. We must pick our best 11 for that game first, then sort out what 11 we can field against Basel with as few players doubling up as possible. No more than 1 or 2 players should be playing both games (not including Cech). If that means we lose against Basel with a second 11 then so be it.

I thought more people would be interested, given we've probably played more games with just two days recovery than anybody else in Europe this season.

It is not the number of games that is the issue. It is how much rest is required between games to maintain performance that is the issue. There was a study done last year of over 12,000 European matches over ten years, looking at how the number of days recovery between games affected results. It found that three days recovery was sufficient: If you play on Wednesday, then recover Thursday, Friday & Saturday and play again on Sunday then the performance in the Sunday game will not be affected. Two days recovery is insufficient: Play on Thursday, then recover Friday and Saturday, and play again on Sunday and you are 46% more likely to lose the Sunday game, and 75% more likely to conceed a goal in the last half hour. I started a thread on this a couple of weeks ago. I looked at how our performance over this season compared with what that report said. Breaking down our results between those games where we had three or more days recovery between games, and those where we had only two games recovery. Our performance this season pretty much matched exactly what that report said: We had lost 51% more games when we had just two days recovery compared with when we had three or more days recovery. Most of those games we lost with just two recovery days, we lost in the last half hour. That doesn't happen when we had three or more days recovery (except when we had two red cards against United). There is more detail in the other thread:http://www.theshedend.com/topic/23300-our-season-results-can-be-explained-by/

Of course this is just one factor affecting our season. But we don't need to just grin and bear it. We need to understand it, and make decisions and prioritise accordingly. We need to understand that we are much more likely to lose against United if we play our best players play against Southampton. We can make that risk go away if we play a weakened 11 against Southampton, but then we're more at risk of losing that game. Those are the risks we need to balance. Rather than just grin and bear it and accept some random crap results we need to plan and prioritise.