I think most Chelsea fans that have supported the club for a lengthy amount of time will agree that the club as a whole has changed significantly down the years.

I grew up in Morden and those that grew up in/near South London will know it is Chelsea heartland and I started supporting Chelsea when Hoddle was manager, we were a bottom half side then and I had no realistic expectations of winning anything or achieving anything other than midtable finishes.

Whilst the mid 70s-mid 90s was a massive struggle for the club and fans older than me had to witness some dark times and dross one thing we could pride ourselves was the effort the players put in. Nevin, Spencer, Clarke, Wilkins, Fillery etc were by no means the greatest players to grace the football field but they wore the shirt with pride and what they may have lacked in technical ability they made up for in effort.

In the past when teased by the gloryhunting Arsenal and United supporters en masse I could pride myself on the fact we simply weren't good enough, but it hurts to watch this current team. We're now in a situation were most of the older players know they are leaving and simply don't care about what state they leave this club.

Opinions on AVB are divided, that discussion on other threads but I personally don't want to see players like Bosingwa, Malouda and Meireles play for my club. Kalou and Mikel are castigated on this forum and by Chelsea fans in general but one of the reasons why I have never been as quick to slam Kalou is because of the effort he puts in, he may not be good enough but I feel he genuinely does care for this club and has some affinity towards us.

I am not one to usually call for managers heads, in fact I have only ever previously called for Grant's head and even then I thought the timing was ridiculously harsh but whilst Spuds are on the up, Arsenal still managing to land on their feet and Wet Spam near certain to get promoted and push on we're in danger of being left behind

I can accept mediocrity but I can't accept the likes of Malouda, Meireles and Bosingwa playing for us week in week out.

You make some very good points, we need to buy Hazard, Lucas and a decent right back and maybe we will be back on track.

Only point I disagree with is that Pat Nevin would walk into AVB's current side, he had all the talent in the world and beat players for fun putting perfect balls on DIxon's bonce.

Some good points made about Chelsea and the London clubs in general.