Socrates

Where did Sarr come from? Such a poor player. Why isn’t he out on loan? He looks nowhere near ready to be a first team starter. He’s well below Guehi and Tomori and yet he finds himself ahead of Chalobah as our fourth choice centre back. How did that get to happen?

Shipping 4 goals to Arsenal and Brentford is unacceptable. Tuchel needs to play his strongest side then make changes within games. Not start with a line up that includes Sarr, Christensen, Lukaku and Loftus Cheek. While not playing Silva or Rudiger. And a midfield of Kante and Loftus Cheek!! What the f**k was that about? Tuchel needs to stop messing up. That was a shocking performance.

Heroic effort by the players to drag the game into extra time. Their first goal though was a killer. We missed some good chances after that. They took their one chance. Just wasn’t meant to be. The first leg was a catastrophe. Tuchel’s selections and Mendy’s brain freeze meant it needed to be a perfect night tonight. It needed Kante to be at his very best. Unfortunately, he wasn’t. But it would be too harsh to blame one player. We fought hard, played some good football, and probably deserved to go through. But too many mistakes over two legs, by players and manager, meant it was too much in the end. No shame in going out like that.

Just being realistic. SMG don't have enough money to make a bid without other finance. Their turnover is roughly 700m. Any other finance would have to be independent of the Saudi government. That would need to be proven. It took Newcastle one year to satisfy the Premier League of the independence of their owners. And everyone knows that was dubious. Chelsea have until the end of the month to get new ownership in place. The only viable options are the US bidders.

I think you’ve just explained why the Saudi Media bid won’t succeed. It would be a huge conflict of interest, too much closeness to the Saudi gov’t, and therefore a closeness between Newcastle and Chelsea. That’s before you even get to the human rights questions. Won’t be allowed to happen. The only viable bids are American. People ought to get used to the fact. No Saudi sheik is going to ride out of the desert with a bagful of money.

Looks like a straight battle between the Boehly and Ricketts bids. I don’t think the Saudi bid is likely given the political background, time constraint, and the uncertainty of who is behind the bid. Of the two US bids, Boehly seems the more convincing.

Rudiger enjoying himself:

One shot apparently in 180 mins of football vs Man City this season. I don’t think you really stand a chance if that’s all you can manage in over three hours.

I was willing to give him a chance. But he’s exactly what everyone feared. No touch, no passing ability, cannot dribble, cannot win a header, and cannot create a chance for himself. He more or less has to have it handed to him on a plate. I don’t think he’s going to improve. He needs to have Chilwell and James fit and putting balls into the box, but without them, he’s literally a liability and we’re better off without him. Not sure that’s what we were hoping for by spending a cool 100m pounds. Really depressing. If there was any chance we could recoup some money for him this summer, I think we’d be better off cutting our losses.

It’s no coincidence that our form has dipped since losing James and Chilwell. I think the plan with Lukaku was based on Chilwell and James being fit and putting balls into the box for him. Now that’s all gone out the window, Lukaku looks a liability. Was very surprised that we started with a front three of Ziyech, Lukaku and Pulisic. Am assuming this was due to injuries or fitness issues. None of them made a compelling case and Pulisic might as well not have been on the pitch while Ziyech was completely wasteful. I’ve been willing to give Lukaku a break but sadly he’s looking like the player we all feared he was. Wonder if there’s any chance we could cut our losses with him over the summer? He’s not going to be the striker we hoped for is he?

It was a shocking debut: underhit passes, passes straight to opponents. But what really struck me was the lack of engagement, lack of tackles or interventions, just dawdling about. Not seen anything like it since Bakayoko, and not what I was expecting at all. I know Villa are a quick, hard-working side, but seriously not sure that’s an excuse and not convinced he’s in any way an upgrade on Gilmour or Ampadu. I thought we were getting a word class player. Now we’re talking about easing him into games, like he’s a kid from the academy. Blimey. We brought him here to start straight away. Clearly that was Tuchel’s thinking yesterday.

Chelsea in talks with Dortmund to loan them Hudson-Odoi.

Thought we looked good until the penalty. Might even had scored a second if we were more clinical. Bit of a mess up between Alonso and Mendy in the lead up to the penalty. Reece James was unlucky to get sent off for that. Solid performance second half. Tuchel made the right calls. Silva and Kovacic were terrific. A determined team performance all round. Everyone did their bit. Not sure Lukaku could do much more on his own upfront. Had very little support. Slightly worrying to see Kante injured again. I wonder if Chalobah is now seen as the fourth midfielder. Overall, a well-earned point that felt like a victory.

Credit to Gareth Bale and Harry Kane. As for our game, it’s a good thing it didn’t matter in the end. Hope Mount, Pulisic and Werner find their shooting boots by next week. The proverbial banjo and cow’s backside come to mind.

Yep. I'd take a win on Tuesday over the FA Cup. Much more important game for us. Hopefully Tuchel will have learned a few things from today's poor performance. Mendy will surely start as well so that's already a positive.

That was a hell of an important win. It didn’t look likely just before half-time. We were facing a penalty, potentially 2-0 down, and we hadn’t created much. Credit to Mendy for keeping his wits and realising in time what Aguero was up to. It changed everything and we came out and played well second half. Some frustrating off-side calls which we really need to work on. But eventually a fantastic strike from Ziyech. We survived that dive from Sterling, thankfully the ref, having given them a soft penalty already, wasn’t going to give them another. Then brilliant play from Hudson-Odoi and Werner in particular to set up the winner for Alonso. Fantastic win, performance, and mentality. Unexpected. But we could do with sealing a top four finish before the CL final. Results went our way in other games too. This is shaping up into a hell of an end to this season. Who’d have guessed?

I really don’t see the strategy here. We’re more likely to qualify for the Champions League by getting points against teams like West Brom, aren’t we? Trying to prioritise Champions League is a big risk and means we’re more likely to fall between two stools. That looks more likely after today. I think Tuchel has done pretty well up to now, but today was a completely self-inflicted disaster. You can’t underestimate teams like that. It’s not like the French or German leagues where so-called “lesser” sides politely roll over for you.

What on earth was Tuchel thinking? I just wish Tuchel would start our strongest players against teams like West Brom. He can take them off second half if they need a rest. We’d lost the game at half time, 2-1 down, ten men, and the wrong players on the pitch. It was a disaster. Why did Tuchel make the Porto game a priority? We’re not going to win the Champions League. Today was a must win game. A good run in the CL is a bonus. But let’s not get carried away. Top four is our priority.

Really nice performance. Good to score that second goal so we could relax a bit. Could’ve been more but Pickford made some good stops. Very impressed by how Tuchel has transformed this squad in such a short space of time. Not just the confidence, but the passing, the solid defending, the movement, everyone seems to know what they are doing. Wasn’t expecting such a radical transformation but credit to the players for buying into Tuchel’s ideas. We look a completely new side.

I think Tuchel has done well FWIW. Considering we were in free fall when Lampard was sacked, he's done well to steady things, stop us leaking goals and we at least are now competitive in games. We're a much more solid unit and our defence has been transformed beyond recognition. We certainly have a base to build on. We still have issues that need sorting. None of which are entirely Tuchel's fault. Giroud and Abraham are limited strikers and Werner's confidence was shot. Tuchel is still trying to work out his best options upfront. I was disappointed he started with Ziyech and Giroud today. It was a strange decision and let their defence off the hook. I'd like to see him try variations of Werner, Pulisic, Havertz, Mount. With Hudson-Odoi on the wing with Alonso/Chilwell. At least it'd be more adventurous and pacy. Would we really lose that much more defensively? It's not as if Giroud and Ziyech are known for tracking back.

Disappointing. We probably had the best chance. Ziyech should have scored with a shot from inside the box. Giroud struggled and didn't hold up the ball very well. Ziyech got better but was largely ineffective. Pulisic and Werner would have given their defence more of a test. But both started on the bench for some reason. Defence was solid again. That's been a definite improvement. Rudiger and Christensen were very good today. Midfield was busy if uninspired. Reece James put in a couple of good crosses when he came on. Mount had a good game and is really the only player who looks capable of opening things up. Balance of the team is still not right. We're just not scoring and the games are running out.

Fantastic result. After a shaky start, we defended really well. We kept going, kept our concentration, got a great goal and saw the game out. Really disappointed that Mount and Jorginho will be missing for the return leg. Thought they were our best players. Going to be tough without them. Wasn’t expecting that good a performance to be fair, but that was a really professional and disciplined display. Christensen, Rudiger and Alonso at the back were terrific. Never thought I’d say that a month ago.

Well that was interesting. It’s been a while since we looked so well organised. Thought we really controlled that. Silva was terrific at the back. Probably MOM. Kovacic and Jorginho excellent in midfield. Long time since one could say that. Jorginho also in contention for MOM. He was superb today. CHO as wing-back giving us a lot of threat. Mount such a composed player for his age. Pulisic looking as if he’s getting back to form. A lot of positives for Tuchel. He’s clearly a smart manager and not afraid to change things. He wasn’t worried about bringing off Tammy at half time, who was having a stinker. Lots to build on. Just needs to get our strikers firing but that was a breath of fresh air to see us looking like a proper football team again.

That was really poor. We held our own for the first five minutes. Fell asleep from a set piece. Didn’t learn our lesson and they scored from the next one. We had a chance to get back in the game with the Mount free-kick after the penalty that wasn’t given. But he didn’t get it anywhere near the goal. They then went down the pitch and scored and it was game over. They had two more good chances. We didn’t create anything of note till the chalked-off Werner effort. But 4-0 wouldn’t have been an unfair result. Leicester took their foot off the pedal as we were well beaten. No need to exert themselves more than necessary. A lot of poor performances all over the pitch. We looked as if we’d barely been coached. Players didn’t have a clue, a direction, an option. We were just making it up as we were going along. What on earth do we do on the training pitch? It was lamentable. Sorry to say this as Lampard was a genius player. But he’s out of his depth at this level. We need to get a proper manager in. This squad is crying out for some tactical discipline and nous. It’s not a good time to bring in a new coach. But we can’t allow this to go on.

I don’t think today was the day to experiment by playing Werner through the middle and bringing in Ziyech after an injury lay off. I’d personally have saved that one for Morecambe in the FA Cup.