bluedave

Oh Steve, what a goal that would have been.

I keep thinking Pep is Neto's Doppelganger. It's uncanny.

Yeah, I thought it was just one of those things at first, the footballing equivalent of a "racing incident". But seeing it again now it's textbook dangerous play. Doesn't matter if it accidental, it was reckless and could have done Martinez serious damage.

That was coming. What an absolute shambles. JP f**ked up big time. Wait... VAR to the rescue? We still look shell shocked.

Arsenal 2 - 2 Chelsea, Havertz 37

I think that's got to be a part of it. People who know he cost the Earth and don't watch him for 90 mins every week, but just notice his name pop up fairly often on the scoresheet and see his actually quite good goal/assist stats. TV highlights packages will emphasize his goals and assists, but may not show all the times he gets dribbled past through the middle of midfield (this is one of the major weaknesses that Adam Clery highlights in his video) like there's nobody there. I will also be following his progress (and Maresca's) at city this season with some interest. He's already generally disliked throughout England, so it won't take much for the Manc fans to turn on him, which would also reflect on Maresca since he's Maresca's man.

Adam Clery did a pretty good video on Fernandez's strengths and weaknesses. The TLDR is, he's good on the ball but a liability off it, and maybe Elliot Anderson will do all the "dog work" that Fernadez can't/won't do. I personally think his weaknesses significantly outweigh his strengths for us and he just seems like a right twat, so I'm glad I won't have to endure seeing him playing every week anymore. https://youtu.be/Qd5rwf-rPiI?si=EPAQnNfiH5uFuufd I've said it before, but it baffles me how differently most Chelsea supporters see his "talent" compared to (what feels like) a general consensus among "football people", pundits and the media, who seem to consider him an "elite" midfielder. 125 million is ridiculous for such a flawed player; the market is completely insane and something has to give.

For me it's mostly Spurs and Liverpool, followed by Leeds and West Ham. I suppose the current Arsenal team would be up there now, but historically I've not given much of a sh*t about them. Couldn't care less about the manc clubs.

Well at least we're joint top with Hull (and Maresca's Man City).

Right, he f**ked up but why is he the one trying to defend it though? It's not even his side of the pitch.

That Brighton goal was a cracker, TBF. Neto could have done better, but he's not a defender so it is what it is. As ever, we just have to outscore them.

That was fantastic work by Neto. Thought that was 3-0 for certain, I'm amazed JP didn't score from there.

Chelsea 3-2 Brighton, Palmer 19

It's funny to me to see how nobody is passing to Sanchez (and vice versa). It would be interesting to see how that compares to Penders against Luton. Also interesting to see how James is the hub of the team in midfield on that right hand side, especially when I often notice people here complaining that he's not a midfielder.

He's going to score more against us than he ever did for us, isn't he?

Seeing Fulham's chances again this morning has really hammered home how bad Sanchez was. He flatters to deceive sometimes by occasionally producing some Hollywood saves and convincing people with goldfish memories that he's a good "shot stopper", but he is not - the first Fulham goal was just embarrassing, and the way he rebounded the ball directly onto Garcia's head for their second was the assist of the match in a match with some impressive assists (Palmer for Pedro, Lacroix for Rogers, Pedro for palmer). It started even before the Fulham goal; when he fluffed King's longshot at about 20 mins I knew it was going to be an interesting night (and King was nailed on to score). At the other end of the scale, that was the best match Palmer's had in ages. He seemed to be enjoying himself and our front three showed some good chemistry. Pedro's finish for the first goal was class, and if he had gotten that volley from Palmer's cross on target it would have been a fantastic goal (people reacting with "should have scored" after that don't have a clue). Lacroix also impressed me, and as a centre back he had no business assisting Rogers for his debut goal in the way he did. There's still a lot of room for improvement in defence and in goal, but it felt like a massive upgrade on the impotent sideways football Pep Junior and Linkedin Liam had us playing.

That's a natural consequence of buying sh*t players, nobody wants to buy them when it's time to sell. So it's more of a buying problem then a selling problem, as I see it. We seem to do OK at selling decent players like Cucu, Santos, Trev, etc. Getting €21.00m for George was pretty good going.

Haha, GB news know how to trigger their audience.

It happened about 10 years ago now. I wouldn't recommend looking him up if you have any respect left for humanity. What he did is almost as bad as Enzo's courting of Real Madrid.

I'm two episodes in and I quite like it, but it really is just a love-letter to Jose so far. I guess this is because it's covering the period where his star was on the rise and he could seemingly do no wrong. It was interesting to learn about his origin story in episode 1, I knew very little about him prior to his Porto days. It is a nice excuse to sit down and revisit those memories though. With Jose, Roman and that core of brilliant players and leaders we had at the time, it was the perfect storm and we're lucky to have experienced it. How things have changed.

You mean Kevin Davies? If you mean Kevin Davis, the psycho who killed his mother with a hammer, "twirled" her brain around in her head and then raped her corpse then yeah, that would be a hard sell to the Chelsea faithful, but I think there are still people on this forum who'd prefer to have him in the squad over the despicable Enzo Fernandez.

I misread that as Kevin Phillips (it even says on his wiki "not to be confused with Kalvin Philips"), and thought, if he's still playing he could be another geriatric signing to add to the collection, I always rated him in his Sunderland days. Unfortunately, he is 53 years old and is plying his trade as a (not very successful) lower league coach. Shame...

Straight swap for Delap, send him back to the club that spawned him.

Fulham 1-3 Chelsea, Rogers 13

City's players have seen Pep's replacement and now it's a "rats fleeing a sinking ship" scenario.