So where do we think our squad currently stands compared to the one we started last season with?

Our keepers havent changed so not much point looking at that, though we have made a very significant signing for our future.

Defensively we have one new addition in Luiz, one who has left in Zhirkov and one left back who has stepped up to 2nd choice in Bertrand. We also kept Alex who was rumoured to be leaving, though I do think we are still weak at RB (though thats now been said for at least 5 years)

Midfield is the big change in my opinion. We have seen Benayoun leave (and Zhirokov sort of) and the addition of Mereiles, Oriol (or Romeu or whatever he wants to be known as) and a fairly positive boost for McEachran from AVB saying he wont allow him to go on loan as he will play a bigger part this season. We also now have Ramires who has had his initial season in the PL to settle in. So in midfield I think we are much stronger and also have more flexibility and choice.

Attack has seen massive additions also, literally in Lukaku`s arrival (he huge man, he huge) and the most exciting change of all, Juan Mata. The spark of genius we have been begging for since Robben and Duff left and Joe cole began his rapid fall from grace. We also have added Torres, though the jury is still out on him.

So all in all I do think we have a much stronger squad than last season, a slightly stronger first choice 11 than last season but with more flexibility within the squad for change.

Time will tell whether AVB can change the way we play significantly enough to have an impact this season or it will take until the next before we see the effect he has on the team. I am looking forward to this season, but so much more looking forward to next.

Edited September 4, 201114 yr by dkw

Cech - Cech - No change

Hilario - Hilario - No change

Turnbull - Turnbull - No change

Cole - Cole - No change. Maybe will need to be rested more this season though;

Bertrand - PVA - Could be argued PVA was backup last year, but only barely. Anyway, I've not seen enough of either really to compare them, so we'll say roughly No change.

Terry - Terry - N/C

Alex - Alex - N/C really, although he's looked a bit slower and more clumsy to me.

Ivanovic - Ivanovic - N/C

Luiz - Bruma - Added a bit of class and pace at the back. So definite improvement here.

Bosingwa - Bosingwa - N/C

Ferreira - Ferreira - N/C

Mikel - Mikel - N/C

Romeu - (empty) - Too soon to say since I've never seen him play, but a decent youngster is always an improvement on nothing..

Essien - Essien - Meh. Barely ever plays. N/C

Lampard - Lampard - Slight decline, but would still expect about 10-15 goals in all comps this season and a few assists.

Ramires - Ramires - Definitely improved since the start of last season. Took a few months to settle in.

Meireles - Benayoun - Benayoun never did much for me really, so this is probably an improvement.

McEachran - McEachran - N/C except he's a year older and a bit more experienced now after 15 or so apps last season.

Malouda - Malouda - Hard to say if he's still on the decline or has picked up a bit, because he can score a few goals but still be appaling at everything else, so time will tell.

Mata - Zhirkov - Massive improvement on the left, finally a player with a bit of pace and trickery who is not afraid to actually take on a defender.

Kalou - Kalou - N/C

Sturridge - Sturridge - Year older, more experienced after a good loan spell. So an improvement on the Sturridge of this time last year.

Drogba - Drogba - Hard to say. He's been poor so far, but he's not had much game time. May have to accept a roel on the bench if Torres is preferred. But probably a slight declination over last year's Drogba.

Anelka - Anelka - N/C

Lukaku - (empty) - Improvement. Good young player with lots of potential.

Torres - (empty) - Well. Could go on for ages here, but at the moment Torres is looking worse than having an empty space in the squad, because we are forced to play him due to the fee and the pressure on him to start scoring, even when he's horribly out of form. But if he can get back to being world class, or even just pretty good, then a very big improvement.

All in all, better squad with some more options. The club needs another transfer window or 2 to slowly shift out some and to continue adding top quality 22/23 year olds.

[PLAYER SUMMARY THING]

Agreed with pretty much everything you said until you got to Torres at the bottom; Think he has been one of our better players so far this season (although no goals yet) and the addition of Mata is only going to improve matters.

Got to say things are looking up for the boys in blue. United have started off in great form, but as we know from last year that doesn't really mean very much. Come the end of the season, I think we've got as good a chance as anybody else to be sitting at the top of the table.

There's also the chance that we don't need to do a huge amount more in the transfer market over the next few seasons if some of our kids live up to the potential they've shown so far - the obvious Sturridge and McEachran are looking like cracking the first team pretty soon and guys like Kakuta, Bertrand/PVA, Romeu, Hutchinson, Mellis, Piazon, Lukaku, Chalobah, Clifford, Kaby etc might not be too far behind. If even half of these guys turn out as good as they should we'll be in a pretty good place.

Agreed with pretty much everything you said until you got to Torres at the bottom; Think he has been one of our better players so far this season (although no goals yet) and the addition of Mata is only going to improve matters.

Torres was one of our best players so far? I must have watched a different Chelsea then.

Well, he was a common and deserved pick for MOTM against Stoke. And when Mata came on last week Torres immediately looked much more dangerous.

We're definitely better this year. We've added a potential star. We've added youth and depth. We've upgraded Yossi to Meireles as BlueSkies says. The question to me is whether we have kept up.

As the thread is 'are WE better this year than last' it would be hard to say anything other than yes.. (only time will tell if we've kept up ?)

We have added, Meireles, Torres, Liuz, and a handful of very promising youngsters so we have to be stronger. I'm really looking forward to this season, even though i think we'll finish third while we make the 'transformation'.

Alan

Mata - Zhirkov - Massive improvement on the left, finally a player with a bit of pace and trickery who is not afraid to actually take on a defender.

Some one obviously didnt see the Russia match this weekend.

Wont dispute the improvement part however.

Our bench vs Arsenal (Home) last year (October 2010):

Turnbull

Kakuta

PVA

Josh

Zhirkov

Ferreira

Sturridge

======================

Our possible bench vs Sunderland (September 2011):

Hilario

Alex

Luiz

Meireles

Malouda

Anelka

Drogba

I think that tells us all we need to know about squad comparisons from this year to last year.

To my mind we are much better equipped to cope with injuries this year. Essien is injured yet we still have a strong squad and strength in depth.

Edited September 5, 201114 yr by Myles_91

Chelsea are a bit deeper and quite a bit younger. Also generally healthier.

But I think Manchester United and City have leaped ahead. City finally found their magic ingredient and seem to be playing as a team. (I wonder if the positive attitudes of Dzeko and Aguero aren't the difference, in place of the moody Balotelli and Tevez.)

Ashley Young and Tom Cleverley seem to be great additions for United, for whom Rooney is currently playing out of his mind.

Chelsea may have improved but I think they've lost ground to the other two.

Edited September 5, 201114 yr by wxwax

Meireles played for Portugal during the week... it'd be a bit odd if it took him a month to get fit for us.

We are slighly better than last year. At least we won't be playing Paulo at centre back or Zhirkov in central midfield anytime soon. I really look forward to see what Sturridge can deliver, it's like another signing. However I think we will be in trouble again if anything goes wrong with Mata.

Chelsea are a bit deeper and quite a bit younger. Also generally healthier. But I think Manchester United and City have leaped ahead. City finally found their magic ingredient and seem to be playing as a team. (I wonder if the positive attitudes of Dzeko and Aguero aren't the difference, in place of the moody Balotelli and Tevez.) Ashley Young and Tom Cleverley seem to be great additions for United, for whom Rooney is currently playing out of his mind. Chelsea may have improved but I think they've lost ground to the other two.

Tend to agree. We need Torres to perform, and that includes scoring goals. If he does we have improved otherwise we are stuffed this season. Mata looks huge but Zhirkov going forward was at times also excellent. However very inconsistent and seemed to give up if nothing happened.

Boswinga is fit this season as is Alex, as is Lampard. On the losses side Essien is out but then Essien has been on the way out ever since his second ligament injury.

Might add that we also have a new manager and his performance in making a team out of the players and giving us some style is going to matter at the margin. City and ManU are both strong so we will have to be at our best.

My thoughts are that we just struggle along trying not to drop too many points compared to the Manc(s) for another month or two and then hopefully hit our best in the back half of the season. For instance I'll be happy to get a draw at OT.

Little bit offtopic but the games against Manchester teams will show how good our current squad is. If we can put a good performance at OT and snatch a point or even a win I think we can go all the way. The momentum is with the manc teams at the moment so we need to put a great performance and every player needs to be at their best.

The first game comes very soon a lot sooner than I'd hope. Would be great to find the most functional trio upfront before the game but because of Mata's late arrival and Sturridge's suspension that is not possible.

If our backline stays strong I think we have a chance as ManU's defending and goaltending is not their best asset at the moment. Evans is a player who takes cards very easily and is a liability in every sense IMO. Sad they have the OT refereeing advantage which is massive factor in tight games.

Coming back to the topic I think on paper we have stronger squad but only time will tell really.

Chelsea are a bit deeper and quite a bit younger. Also generally healthier.

But I think Manchester United and City have leaped ahead. City finally found their magic ingredient and seem to be playing as a team. (I wonder if the positive attitudes of Dzeko and Aguero aren't the difference, in place of the moody Balotelli and Tevez.)

Ashley Young and Tom Cleverley seem to be great additions for United, for whom Rooney is currently playing out of his mind.

Chelsea may have improved but I think they've lost ground to the other two.

I agree but I still think we can go up at least another gear.

Nobody can say we have played well in any of the 3 games we've played.

City are unlikely to play as well as they did against Spurs and the same for United against Arsenal. As someone said earlier, if we can beat Sunderland and go into the game 2 points behind United (at worst), a draw at this stage would by no means rule us out of contention. We are more than capable of beating United at OT.

3 games into last season we looked sensational, then we quickly faded after Lampard and Dorgba went off. We had a ok start to the season, and will get better for sure. United had a good start, but with quite a few young players in the team, and no experienced big game player like Sneijder, they are far from unbeatable. Let's face, there was no better time to play Arsenal like they had. City got the players to win everything, in fact they have too many options I don't know how are they going to juggle Aguereo, Tervez, Dzeko, Silva, Nasri, Super Mario into 1 team, funny enough they don't have a world class central defender.

Funny enough they don't have a world class central defender.

They do have one, and I remember we nearly signed him too.

Little bit offtopic but the games against Manchester teams will show how good our current squad is.

Coming back to the topic I think on paper we have stronger squad but only time will tell really.

It's hard to say "the squad is stronger" as although we have added some quality players, some of the existing players are in decline and therefore as each season goes by, they are having more of a negative affect. I think AVB will need a whole season at least to get the squad how he really wants it. He has made a decent start but also has had to "make do" to some extent.

As you say, the matches against the Manchester teams will be a real test of where we are. I am confident that we can beat them both on our day, BUT am equally worried about how frail we look at times. On Chelsea TV last night they showed how we were completely opened up by one pass in the games against WBA and Norwich. Of course we will set up differently against Utd and City, but our midfield and defence do look very flat-footed at times and the way Utd & City break with speed, we are going to need to be right on our game.

It's hard to say "the squad is stronger" as although we have added some quality players, some of the existing players are in decline and therefore as each season goes by, they are having more of a negative affect. I think AVB will need a whole season at least to get the squad how he really wants it. He has made a decent start but also has had to "make do" to some extent.

As you say, the matches against the Manchester teams will be a real test of where we are. I am confident that we can beat them both on our day, BUT am equally worried about how frail we look at times. On Chelsea TV last night they showed how we were completely opened up by one pass in the games against WBA and Norwich. Of course we will set up differently against Utd and City, but our midfield and defence do look very flat-footed at times and the way Utd & City break with speed, we are going to need to be right on our game.

We have traditionally(JT, Lamps, Drogs-era) played with backline that won't be too hesitant to go forward and they stay relatively low all the time. Now with AVB he is trying to bring the Barca type of play into Chelsea by utilizing high backline that can immediately put pressure on opponent when we lose the ball. If you look at Barca they are like angry hornets pressuring opponent right after they lose the ball. Actually Fabregas tells the same thing in his latest interview where he told it will take time to adapt to their style.

It will take time and it can look really bad when it doesn't work, schoolboy mistakes. But when it starts to work percentually your ball control is so high that opponents lose their touch and stop creating. The same thing we have always encountered in our trips to Camp Nou. We have always tried to play 0-0 or try to get a lucky counter-attack goal.

This can only be achieved with very talented players and you need to give it time to work. The latter part is something Roman isn't accustomed to so we'll have to see what AVB does.

Other than by a straight comparison of players in and out, accompanied by a betrayal of our likes and dislikes, it is difficult to gauge improvements or otherwise until we have settled as a squad and, more importantly, AVB has influenced the situation tactically. For me, the key element in all this is the midfield and, sadly, any favourable comparison made is nowhere near as stark as it would have been had Modric arrived because, even after a handful of games, I’m guessing we would have seen some tangible evidence of the quick transition palpably lacking last season. Be that as it may, I think the opportunity is there once again for McEachran to make the impression we were all hoping for back then, if only AVB ‘seizes the day’ and gives him a start or two early in this campaign.

Furthermore, Oriol Romeu, should he be given his chance to prove it, will move the ball forward and at a quicker pace than Mikel, thereby providing another comparable plus. Also, as any comparison of Frank’s performances of late with those of previous seasons simply borders on the unrecognisable, it might not be too long before we see Ramires take over the box-to-box duties full time whilst the Barca B boy and Josh emerge as the holding two in a 4-2-3-1 formation - now that really would be a vivid comparison to make! It would also beg a vital question of the two wide men in the system, let alone the lone striker. For me, they would have to be Mata and Sturridge and, in so selecting, another comparison might be made with Carlo’s player preferences, formations and previous lack of width, with the ultimate choice of striker at the sharp end being made between Torres and Lukaku - sorry, Didier and Nico, but, if AVB sees the bigger picture sooner rather than later, your Premiership days should be numbered in single digits on one hand and your concentration be on Champions League glory.

This leaves us with the defence and a comparison between its current state and that seen [in disbelief] embodied in our slump last year - a similarity, to be honest, that is too close for comfort. Why this should be (then as well as now) is hard to fathom, but it needs to be addressed and I believe it would have been had Alex left in the transfer window. That’s not to say Alex is a cause [just a concern] and if he wants regular first team action there would appear to be little alternative to a move in January. Comparing the Bosingwa of last season with his start this time around reflects vast improvement under AVB, a big plus enabling Branna to paper over cracks as a CB until we decide what is his best position and whether or not to we go for Cahill in the next window. David Luiz is deliberately left out of that debate because his versatility has still to be put to the test, although once it has and we’ve seen him in a holding midfielder role you never know…the others named might be forced to turn their talents to other positions. The left side requires no comparisons whatsoever, as Ash sails on serenely year after year, although I am pleased that Bertrand is installed as understudy rather than have him going on yet another loan spell. Meanwhile we have Patrick van Aanholt openly comparing his loan with that of Tom Cleverley‘s last season, so we must assume he’s happy and everything seems to have resolved itself FB-wise quite satisfactorily.

Last, but by no means least, the goalkeeping situation bears true comparison with last season in so far as it is akin to having the same prospects hanging by a thread whenever Petr is injured and we may yet rue the day that Thibaut Courtois was loaned out, especially when you consider that big money was paid (presumably to make that difference between this season and last) in much the same affluent way as we secured Oriol and Lukaku and yet they are learning their trade at the Premiership coalface and he is not. A goalkeeper of this lad’s obvious potential could have had the opportunity (perhaps even over the last few weeks) of taking the same route in circumstances that would have benefited the first team squad immeasurably and, as we have seen with an unsteady De Gea at United, there really is no substitute for that type of experience in the long run.

So, in conclusion, I have to agree with dkw [that we have a stronger squad than last season] but the jury remains out regarding our flexibility for change (in truth we had it last season without using it) and the comparative strength of the teams, which can only be seen to be evolving if players such as Sturridge, Mata, Torres and Lukaku gel as a unit, bolstered by the emerging talent that is McEachran and Romeu. Put another way, a midfield of Ramires, Mikel and Frank, supporting Kalou, Didier/Nico and Malouda doesn’t quite set the pulse racing as it did in the past.

So, in conclusion, I have to agree with dkw [that we have a stronger squad than last season] but the jury remains out regarding our flexibility for change (in truth we had it last season without using it) and the comparative strength of the teams, which can only be seen to be evolving if players such as Sturridge, Mata, Torres and Lukaku gel as a unit, bolstered by the emerging talent that is McEachran and Romeu. Put another way, a midfield of Ramires, Mikel and Frank, supporting Kalou, Didier/Nico and Malouda doesn’t quite set the pulse racing as it did in the past.

Very nicely summed up Dorset and that last sentence really does say it all.

We now have more personnel who can change a game and I wonder how long AVB will give it before he changes that starting midfield three. After the first defeat? Hopefully he won't take as long as Carlo did.

i think mata is a great addition he is goina work well with fernando and lukaku could become an aerial threat as torres is very weak in the air...

i think mata is a great addition he is goina work well with fernando and lukaku could become an aerial threat as torres is very weak in the air...

I actually disagree with torres being a aerial threat. One would think this looking at him, however watching his goals for lfc he scored some great headers and quite a lot tbh.

I actually disagree with torres being a aerial threat. One would think this looking at him, however watching his goals for lfc he scored some great headers and quite a lot tbh.

I may be wrong, but i do recall him scoring a great header against untied at old trafford