Barrettinator

Better LWB than Alonso.

Unlucky to not have a goal and assist.

Cesc imo will still be playing at a high level by then. Pace has never been a part of his game. Bit like Pirlo in that aspect. And players like that never lose their vision. Don't think we should let Cesc go but knowing our policy, he'll be offered a 1 year deal, which won't be good enough for him as he'll also be offered 3-4 year deals by other attractive clubs in Europe. So in the end, you might be right. RLC might be his replacement. If Conte rates him.

Always good to bury the hatchet, ehy?

Bit of overreaction by Chelsea fans over Conte's comments. Saying he sees himself going back to Italy in the future doesn't mean he wants to go next year or in 2019. Keep in mind he's only 47. That's VERY young for a manager. There's nothing saying he can't spend 5 years at Chelsea before moving back to Italy. I don't think anyone ever really thought he'd be a long term Chelsea manager. His strong personality along with our sometimes overly intrusive board and trigger happy owner make that highly unlikely. If we're lucky, we get 5 maybe 7 years from him. That would be impressive in my book, considering the lifespan of managers these days, especially Chelsea managers. When he does leave, we should go after Maurizzio Sarri. Has anyone watched Napoli play over the past 2 seasons and coming into this season? By far the most entertaining side in Europe. Sarri could work absolute wonders with players like Hazard and Morata. That said, Conte's still our manager and I hope he manages us into the new stadium (as he has alluded to) before he leaves. With any luck, he'll win us another CL.

Imagine when he starts playing regularly with an in-form Hazard. We got Torres at the wrong point in his career but it looks like we've gotten another incarnation of Torres (of sorts) at just the right time. Absolute peach of a player. He'll only get better!

I slated Conte last week for getting it wrong and I'm happy to be back to praising him this week. Got everything absolutely bang on. Perfect lineup and he obviously had an eye on Atletico & City so didn't start Hazard. Started Rudiger too which was badly needed. With how calamitous Alonso was today, I shudder to think what the outcome of having Cahill rather than Rudiger behind him would have been. Thankfully, Conte also hauled Alonso off when he'd lost his head. Brilliant away performance by the entire team bar Willian and Pedro (excluding the goal). Even Cahill done well dealing with Crouch.

Fine. If he'll accept being a squad player (which is possible considering he has spoken of his desire to get a passport) despite it being a world cup year then that's fine. But there's no reason he should be starting league or CL games for us.

Our captain.

It's time to start making plans to move Willian on. Wasted potential. Such a brain dead player 70% of the time with 20% good performances and the occasional 10% excellent games. I see no reason why we should keep playing Willian when Musonda who has bags of talent and a lot to offer is sitting in the reserves. I hope Charly grabs his chance in the EFL on Wednesday with both hands. Our rotation needs to be Hazard > Pedro > Musonda >>>>>> Willian. At this point, if Musonda does as well as I think he can, he'd even push Pedro out of the starting lineup. I've officially had it with Willian. He's 29 years old and he's never ever going to be better than he is.

You know what's frustrating? He admitted that he took Pedro off at halftime because he was struggling after the knock he took in the 28th minute or so. In other words, if Pedro was alright, he may not have subbed on Bakayoko until maybe the 60th-65th minute around when he usually brings on his first sub. This was really a game to forget for Conte. Lost us 2 points here.

Oh he definitely did. Slowed down okay multiple times. Made the negative pass back to Luiz or Courtois in a lot of situations where he could have passed it progressively into midfield to Kante or Cesc. Always took forever to actually make a bloody pass. That extra 1-3 seconds makes a lot of difference in whether we succeed in catching Arsenal out of shape and/or breaking their press or not. Rudiger was a lot better at this. Much better. In fact, there was a sequence where he was by the throw-in line and told Kante to stay clear of the ball as if to indicate he was about to punt it forward, then proceeded to faff about until the Arsenal players decided to press him and then he made a stupid back heel pass to Kante who he had told to stay away and who clearly wasn't prepared to receive a pass. Of course Kante rushed to kick the ball back to Cahill to prevent turning it over to Arsenal. Cue a mix of chaos with the ball deflecting back to Cahill and then instead of eventually punting it back up the pitch, he punts it into row Z. If anyone had a clip of it, please post it. Just an utterly brain dead sequence. It was baffling. Had to have made Conte cringe.

Got his tactics wrong today, starting from the lineup. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. In 4 games, Kante-Cesc got overrun and beaten by Arsenal's midfield 3 times and he started them both AGAIN despite Bakayoko being the only choice that made sense. I mean if you were REALLY going to start a 2 man midfield (which should have been 3 from the start) then it should have been Kante-Bakayoko ffs! No reason Willian should have started. No reason Cahill should have started either. We get an Arsenal low on confidence with a midfield that got overrun by the likes of Wijnaldum and Can and we completely bottle it. They were there for the taking and we bottled it. I'm not sure if Conte shows Wenger too much respect or if he just doesn't know how to crack Wenger tactically but it's really annoying. Imagine Arsenal not being scared of playing us anymore. Imagine having to be worried about playing Arsenal, a more often than not guaranteed 4-6 points every season. Even the worst Chelsea managers of the Roman Era have made light work of Wenger and Arsenal. AVB was the only one to truly bottle it iirc. Conte needs to get his head sorted out. We can't keep performing like this against Arsenal. In my opinion, we dropped points here mainly because of Conte. Very disappointing as we've lost 2 points on the Manchester clubs.

We didn't give up on him. He gave up on us (for now) and who can blame him? Saw a tweet from Simon Johnson some weeks after the transfer saying we did in fact insert a buy back clause though so who knows how that could play out.

I'd try to go for Mario Gomez in January if I were Conte. Same skill set as Llorente but more talented. Though I doubt Wolfsburg would want to let him go.

Interesting input from Joey Barton though I'd take it with a grain of salt. Still, if it's true, it puts a new twist on the situation.

If he's smart, he'll have a sit down with Conte and apologise. Put his head down and play whatever games he can get between now and January. There's a chance that Atletico will still not be willing to pay what he's worth so it's possible he could even be here the whole season. In that case, it would be wise for him to patch things up with Conte as much as possible.

They were prepared to shell out 50m for Lacazette but didn't think Costa was worth that apparently.

It's also downright stupid and weirdly conceited to tag fans who are trying to hold the board accountable for a summer even the manager won't be satisfied with as whinging, entitled fans. But here we are.

Rumours that he's been given the number 8.

Cheer up lads.

Seems like no one's bothered enough to make a Drinkwater thread then? He's a Chelsea player and deserves our backing. Hopefully he exceeds our expectations. He did win a title with Kante beside him. http://www.chelseafc.com/news/latest-news/2017/08/drinkwater-joins-chelsea.html

A smart person would point out what part of my opinion has been irrational. But I guess it's easier to just say I'm moaning. Carry on then.

3rd time in a row we've failed to upgrade a title winning team. Makes me miss Kenyon.