bleed_blue

Its a no brainer reg. who Luiz should replace in our team. We have been carrying a passenger in that midfield far too long and time has come to put him on the bench. Giving Mikel 5 years was the daftest thing that the management could have done.

Romeu's injury might prove to be more damaging to Mikel than Romeu in the longer term. With no fallback option, Chelsea might go and buy some genuine DM and once an actual DM plays, Mikel's starting XI days will be numbered.

wrt finals: we played CL finals with 10 men behind the ball. Even Didier Drogba was back to help out the midfield and defense. Very hard to look bad in such circumstances. big games: Chelsea Juventus at home, Mikel was awful (remember their second goal?), Chelsea Shkahtar (He should have been marking their attacking AM, Willian for both their goals). Numerous such examples, you just need to accept the reality.

The reason other players are under pressure while Mikel is not, is the opposition knows Mikel wont hurt them. After he recieves the ball he will ponder over it and then make the easiest pass which would add nothing to our attacking build up. During this recycling, the opposition gets time to get back into their defensive positions and hence they become tougher to break down.

Sure. You keep bowling these half volleys and I will keep smashing them out of the park. WRT this blogpost (The stats there are for the last season not 4 seasons as you incorrectly mentioned in your post) He has presented the stats in a misleading way. Let us look at them without that bias. Last year Mikel played 1323 minutes and Romeu played 953 minutes ( mins per ground 50-50 * total ground 50-50s) 1. Ground 50-50s: An ideal DM would win maximum ground 50-50s in a game. Mikel made 161 ground 50-50s and won 55% of them, so he won a ground 50-50 every 14.94 minutes. Romeu made 119 ground 50-50s with 50% success rate, so he won a ground 50-50 every 15.88 minutes. Not enough difference to classify Mikel as excellent. 2. Aerial 50-50s: Using similar interpretation as above, Mikel won an aerial 50-50 every 66 minutes while Romeu won an aerial 50-50 every 119 minutes. So in 2.5 matches Mikel will win 4 and Romeu will win 2. Again not much in it. 3. Tackles: Mikel put 36 tackles with 83.33% success, i.e. a succesful tackle every 44 minutes while Romeu had a successful tackle every 33 minutes. Romeu is much better than Mikel here 4. Interceptions: Mikel made 40 interceptions in 1323 minutes, an interception every 33 minutes while Romeu made 34 interceptions in 953 minutes, i.e. an interception every 28 minutes. Again Romeu is much better 5. Defensive errors and Dribbled past: Romeu is better than Mikel as you can clearly see in that blogpost 6. Pass percent completion: 90.21% vs 89.3%. not much difference there So there you go. Romeu is better at tackles, interceptions, keeping possession while Mikel edges it in 50-50s and slightly in pass completion. Romeu is 19 and will get better by playing with high quality players regularly. Mikel has been at the club for 6 years and giving him more playing time is sadly adding to losses. Edit: this just in from @whoscored: John Obi Mikel: Since Aug 2009, Chelsea have gained an average of 1.87 points per PL game with Mikel starting, compared to 1.98 without him

OK, lets talk about that game and that blogpost. 1. We lost the game. If the best example of Mikel's contribution to the side is a game we lost something is amiss 2. He writes that Mikel was practically playing as a CB and 40/74 were forward passes and only 7 back passes. When he played most of the game as CB (his words not mine), there is only the keeper left behind to give back passes. 50% forward passes should not be a very glowing statistic. 3. If you would go and search for passing stats, most CBs and DMs will have >90% accuracy. So that 86% is again nothing exceptional The "calmness" he brings to the game enables the opposition to settle into their defensive positions making it harder to get past and score goals. That calmness ends up a handicap for Chelsea. Surely, the Mikel supporters can do better than that.

Here is the problem. His supporters define his role in such a narrow way that you take any other name and you will say that they dont play in the same position and hence no comparison. Some of the things that you look for in a player that plays in front of the back four are ball winning, deep lying playmaking, positional discipline etc. Most of the players in this positions will be very good at one of the attributes and above average on others. Lucas, Sandro, De Jong are very good at winning the ball; Scholes, Carrick are good with deep lying playmaking; Yaya Toure is excellent at dribbling with power and taking on players, similarly for Dembele, Diaby.

and how successive Chelsea managers have turned him from another Messi to a DM. :)

With regards to that comparison with Carrick and Scholes, do you see Mikel getting into dangerous positions like Scholes and Carrick sometimes do and making something out of them? Do you see him playing the crossfield long balls which they frequently play?

So let us burst a few myths of Mikel's "contribution" in this team 1. his possession play: After the Athletico Madrid match, their coach had this to say about our team " Mikel plays horizontally. So we opted to doubling/triping up on Lampard, Mata and Hazard, opting to neglect others". You can see evidence of this on the field as well and this he is able to keep possession. The fact that he is not going to play a crossfield or a defense splitting pass gives the other team confidence to leave him unmarked and press other players. 2. he has been immense this season: He has not been. You can go back, look at various goals we have conceded and notice how he was extremely slow at tracking back, covering players etc. Juventus's 2nd goal is a prime example, misplaced a pass and then stood still for the next 6 seconds. In the game vs Shakhtar, when they scored both goals on pullbacks to Willian, the DM should have been covering their AM but Mikel was nowhere close to Willian. Sure other players were also to blame for these but so was Mikel. I can go on with these examples but you will get the drift. 3. Managers have always picked him: Mourinho's first choice was always Makelele and similarly for Avram Grant. A look at matches played will tell you that. Scolari started the season playing Essien at DM but then Essien got injured and thus Mikel was played. Hiddink's first choice midfield was Lamps, Ballack and Essien. Ancelotti tried various players at DM including Ballack, Deco and Mikel. In the biggest game in his second season (CL second leg vs United, he didnt start Mikel). AVB dropped him for Romeu. RDM was the only one in whose regime Mikel was a sure shot starter. Anyways I am not a fan of using Manager's authority to prove that a player is good/important but since you brought it up, thought I will mention all this.

hahaha. You honestly think we can win many games playing that same style and without Drogba ??? PS: I also disagree that he was one of the best players on the pitch

The least mobile player in the entire team. How ironic, he is given extension on the night we will probably be ousted from Champions League ( thanks in no small measure to his contribution (lack of), remember Juve's second goal at bridge). He is jack of a few trades but master at none. Neither an outstanding ball winner nor a reliable deep lying playmaker. What is his role in the team? Only God knows.

Not bothered about this game. No way the Italian master fixers will let us through.

yeah, maybe we will recall Kalas and send Wallace in his place

The thing is, If you were to go after any player and try to find such mistakes, you can do that for 95% of the defenders. Ever since that Gary neville comment (Luiz is controlled by a playstation etc.) so called critics have found him an easy target as it saves them the job of actually analysing the game. Classic example was a report in daily star a few days back about our defeat at West Ham. They were blaming Luiz for another below par performance when he did not even start the game as he was suspended. edit: on that telegraph article, he blames luiz for second goal. He was initially marking RVP but when valencia was left open on the wing, he had to move to cover him. Unlike the article mentions, Luiz did not let valencia ease past him, but he got him in the corner from where valencia got a cross in. The mistake was made when Valencia was let through on the wing by our LB/Midfield not when Luiz went out to cover the flank. The writer also goes on to blame Luiz for an offside goal. Somehow, I dont find that right.

With Paulo Ferreira's contract running out after the end of this season, numbers wont be affected at least.