Lovely blog on the official site

Giles Smith

Fixture wise, I think we would have been hard pressed to hand pick a kinder start to the season.

West Ham and Wigan away can prove tricky fixtures, but you would still expect 3 points at each and West Brom, Stoke and Blackpool at home, well............................

But the manner in which we have won the games so comfortably has been impressive, especially with players missing.

No point getting carried away though. We all know that the games against City and Arsenal will be a LOT tougher and not until after those can we really gauge our start to the season.

Well It's not as if Arsenal or Man U have had a tough fixture to start the season. They've played Liverpool and that's about it. And Pool are sitting pretty at 17 at the moment. They have both dropped points to teams that they should have beaten. If we can win the next 2 (man city and arsenal) we could open up a 7 point lead by mid oct. How crazy is that.

Even draws against Citeh and Le Arse would see us remain top, unless Manure were to hammer both Bolton and Sunderland convincing. We could then argue that we've had the more difficult start having played 2 of last seasons top 5. I wonder whether the obsession with our so called 'easy start' would then disappear.

I am anxious about seeing us amass a large lead early in the season. Obviously youd rather the runaway leader than chasing, but this start has left me hoping we maintain our cool when things go against us later this season.

Next weekend will be a huge test. Im hoping we trouce City and send a message.

I think last year was a fluke. Give our goals scored and goal difference we should have had more points. In baseball they do a runs score/allowed formula that will predict your record for the season. Usually it's pretty close , within a game or 2. Is there something like that in football?

Although not impossible, I guess the odds are against us getting a really tough start to the season. Given the teams currently in the premiership, I think we would be disappointed if we dropped points to the majority of them, if we are to be in contention for the title.

If we did get a tough start, I would lay money on the media bemoaning us an easy run in to the end of season.

I think last year was a fluke. Give our goals scored and goal difference we should have had more points. In baseball they do a runs score/allowed formula that will predict your record for the season. Usually it's pretty close , within a game or 2. Is there something like that in football?

Exactly. I mentioned many times considering how we played, our points did not portray how strong we were. How many points were dropped due to Carlo trying the diamond alone?

Carlo knows the players/league and vice versa, and hence he know nows what works best without having to test systems in league matches. We will be getting more points this season for sure due to that alone.

I think last year was a fluke. Give our goals scored and goal difference we should have had more points.

Games we should never have lost on performance:

Aston Villa Away - should have won

Man City Home and Away - should have drawn at City and won the home game we were the better team

Everton Away - should have gotten a draw

Games we drew we should have won on performance

West Ham Away - should have won this were the better team by a mile

Birmingham Away - Should have won this for sure

Blackburn Rovers Away - Again we were the better team and didnt take our chances

The only games I can think of where we were lucky to win:

Man United Home - we were pretty poor and played sloppily but nicked it :D

Fulham away - Lucky own goal got us a win

So judging on that I definitely agree we didn't get the amount of points we should have

Both Man U and Arsenal have dropped points to "easier" opposition. As Nibds said, the way in which we have been winning has been incredible. And they can't even claim they had harder CL games.

Scott

From the Guardian:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2010/sep/20/five-things-learned-premier-league

Chelsea have enjoyed the longest pre-season in history

So far Chelsea have played five domestic league games and racked up an aggregate scoreline of 21-1, conceding that one goal in the 85th minute of a match they were already winning 3-0. Their away games have been against the teams that ended last season 17th and 16th in the Premier League, while two of the visitors to Stamford Bridge have only just been promoted. The other was Stoke, who last won a league game at Chelsea in 1974 and shipped seven there last season. Chelsea are yet to play anyone who ended last season higher than 11th; every other top-flight side except for Aston Villa has already played one of last season's top seven.

Chelsea cannot be blamed for their excellence, but their season so far has been so comfortable it has begun to reflect badly on the Premier League as a competition. But it's just as well that they had this period in which to play themselves into form, because their actual pre-season was pretty ropey, featuring an unconvincing 1-0 win over Crystal Palace followed by defeats to Ajax, Eintracht Frankfurt, Hamburg, then Manchester United in the Community Shield. Their next league fixtures are against Manchester City and Arsenal.

Yes, it's been an easy start, but some would say you don't want to play the weaker sides at the beginning when they're fresh and injury free, or at the end when they're fighting for their lives.

We look so much stronger in midfield this season, winning the ball cleanly, and not giving away those free kicks that caused us so many problems last season. In that respect Ballack was a liability in my view. Playing alongside Essien and Ramires will hopefully help Mikel blossom into the player we all hoped he would become. Drogba looks hungrier and fitter than at any time since he arrived, and that is the real key to the team's performance.

ManU look decidedly iffy to me. Giggs and Scholes? They must be kidding. Loved seeing Fletcher turn away from Gerrard's free kick. What a wimp. Arsenal always dazzle with their pretty football, but suffer from PMT when the going gets tough, and City will take another year to get it together.

Looks like Fabregas will be out for our game. Cue the excuses now. And Liverpool may have been a top 7 team last year , this year they definably are not. We have played 2 teams ranked in the top 10 THIS year.

From the Guardian:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2010/sep/20/five-things-learned-premier-league

Rubbish. How does it reflect poorly on the league by one team being fantastic?

We are the only team to have a 100% record after 5 games and we have scored boat loads, that indicative of a fantastic team in a strong league. Especially when you consider that the difference between 2nd and 18th is 7 points.

I also hate this "tested crap". They spout on how we havent improved the squad much, its still the same old bodies... and yet they pip "they've not been tested yet" despite beating every big 4 side home/away last season with, as they say, nearly the exact same squad. I mean what exactly needs testing? Has Drogba suddenly lost the plot? Malouda forgot his shooting boots in South Africa? ACole forgot how to run?

BTW, I know its only been 5 games, but anyone else notice how all the promoted teams are in the top half of the table? eVen Blackpool who havent even won a game!

eVen Blackpool who havent even won a game!

They have won 2 of their premier league games.

We can only play what's in front of us, already 4 points up in the 2 away games compare to last year. Last year when we were beating teams up, we conceded a few as well, most memorable was the 7:2 against Sunderland. So far we haven't conceded much. Man City is a huge game, we didn't play that badly against them last year, just short of luck. This time around with a fully fit Essien instead of Ballack, we will go a lot better. They are a team in building, even without the injured players.Playing Arsenal is almost an easy game these days, the only manangers in Roman's era who lost to them were Scolari and Grant, and Grant managed to get his revenage at SB. Villa, a team who usually start well and fade towards the end, it's already fading.

When it's put into facts and figure

Jonathan Wilson

It has been an easy start to the league season, but only because the team have made it look easy. Surely the sign of a cracking team ?

Atleast this easy start puts us well on track for avoiding relegation as well be in deep sh*t by the time weve been shown up by city, utd, l'arse and liverpool.

This excerpt from the Man City pre-match briefing on the official site puts talk of our easy start nicely into perspective:

Nine sides took points off Chelsea last season, and after Saturday's match Carlo Ancelotti's men will have faced three of them (four if we equate promoted West Brom to relegated Hull City) in the first six matches. In that respect the opening fixtures looked quite testing when first published in the summer. Chelsea's dominant early performances have provoked criticism of the quality of opposition, but perhaps the champions are simply better at the moment: in like-for-like games the Blues are already five points better off this campaign, with the opportunity to make that eight by beating the Citizens on Saturday afternoon.

There was very little of this 'Chelsea's season starts here' talk at the same stage in Carlo Ancelotti's debut Premier League season, though the schedule was much the same.

The opening five encounters of 2009/10 were against Hull, Sunderland, Fulham, Burnley and Stoke, after which we had accrued maximum 15 points and a goal difference of +9 (11 fewer than now). Just maybe the champions deserve more credence than we are receiving.

Man United, Man City and Tottenham were equal second, three points behind. The sixth match pitched Chelsea at home to Spurs, much like this weekend brings a visit to fourth-placed City.

LINK

So after the so called 'easy start' followed by our predicted downfall due to fact we hadn't played anyone yet, we're 4 points clear :D

Do the same every half dozen games and we might win the League.