http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/teams/chelsea/9291264/Chelsea-to-make-Pep-Guardiola-another-offer-as-outgoing-Barcelona-coach-hints-at-quick-return-to-management.html

I dont want him at Chelsea or the following reasons;

1) RDM deserves a chance. He has saved our season got all the egos onside and has won us the holy grail. He is te best man to begin the changes at the club.

2) Pep had a unique team at Barca and he pretty much inherited te current team bar a few changes. Anyone with Messi can't go wrong.

3) Tactically looks inept... Against us he lacked plan B. He only played one style and that was to play. This doesn't work in the Prem. You need alternative styles and you need to have tactical awareness.

4) BIG gamble. He will come on a long contract earning silly money. I it all goes tits up we will sack him and another huge payoff.

I would steer well clear personally but unfortunately our club is all about the 'Name'. ROMAN IF YOU READ THIS GIVE RDM WHAT HE DESERVES!! He saved our season he worked wonders with the players and hes a Chelsea man!!!

Welcome to the site, but there's already a thread for this in the rumours section.

I agree 100% with above. RDM has the respect of the players, they signings are from above, and PG is not proven outside Barcelona. Also, first season in trouble, he quit! Anyone else cheering on Athletico on Sat?!

I agree 100% with above. RDM has the respect of the players, they signings are from above, and PG is not proven outside Barcelona. Also, first season in trouble, he quit! Anyone else cheering on Athletico on Sat?!

They are playing Athletic now, 3-0 up before the second half...

The main worry for me is he's too similar to wenger. Can he build a defense? We have one of the strongest defenses in Europe. I wouldn't want that to fade away, similar to what happened when AVB came in. Arsen inherited his best defense, Barca defense is pretty sh*te, and in the premier league its obvious that a strong defense is a necessity if you want to challenge for the title.

08-09 = 105 scored, 35 against.

09-10 = 95 scored, 24 against.

10-11 = 95 scored, 21 against.

11-12 = 114 scored, 29 against.

Doesn't strike me as a "bad" defense at all. What happened against us is a different story, since they had to throw everyone up.

I'm not buying into the whole "plan B" thing. If only Messi had the spine to deal with the pressure from taking a penalty, the story may have been different. They were really unskillful against us over two legs; any other match with the chances they had on the Bridge would have seen us letting 3-4 or even 5 goals in.

Not saying that Pep is the man, and I also think that RDM deserves a shot, but people can't be that stupid to think that Barcelona only feeds of Messi. After all, Pep is the one who has made Messi into what he is today.

I think it's pretty safe to assume that if Pep is available that RA is definitely going to make a play for him. And if you believe any of the reports, Pep is available.

As to whether or not he fits Chelsea, I'm on the fence. I know that Pep has gone from the reserves team to the first team. I agree that Pep has seen a lot of these players and made some of them into the players that they are today. He's done a fantastic job at Barca.

Chelsea is a completely different setup. The similarity is the pressure on the manager to succeed.

What none of us have seen is Pep walking into a team that is different. If he goes the route of trying to mimic Barca here, he's going to fail at first. We are not Barca. The question I have is can Pep play to the strengths of this team while trying to mold us into what he feels is his squad moving forward?

We know RDM can play to the strengths of this team, he's done it. It's hard to say no to RDM, but I feel that if Pep is truly available that he's the guy that RA will want no matter how much the players, and us fans, love RDM.

If it were me in charge, my important criteria is trophies. RDM already has 2 with what most believe is the "weakest" squad we've had in years. I wouldn't be able to say no to RDM.

i'm not RA though, and I'm not in charge. It's going to be interesting to see where this goes.

Their defence is not at all about their defenders, though. It's about how much possession they have in the game. It means that they concede basically no chances against most opposition and their defenders themselves have nothing to do. It also means they need a different breed of defender than we currently have. This can be seen by Guardiola converting Mascherano into a centre back.

I don't buy the plan B thing, either but I don't think he's the right fit for the club, as I said in the other thread, I don't think he'll handle the personalities we have.

no thank you , as the poster above stated , Pep has had the easiest job in the history of football , he inherited a squad with the likes of messi iniesta xavi puyol etc 3 of them are in the top 5 players in the world atm , i reckon if i was manager of barca with that team id win at least 1 cup ffs ! haha .. some of his decisons are abit strange like playing maschrano at centre back as well .

Id prefer keeping RDM and just hope he can prove that he can build a team and buy 2/3 world class players this summer , after winning the CL we arent going to have a better time to make thses world class signings the likes of Lucas Hazard etc thats all thats missing from making our team into a CL Winners contenders every season .

If we were to get rid of RDM id have to go with Capello i reckon now Mourinho has recently signed a new contract at Madrid . but yer RDM shoudl get it .

I don't understand why I'm defending Pep, since I despise their (Barcelona's) players and don't particularly like the football philosophy, but some of you guys really need to get a grip on yourselves.

Barcelona won the Champions League and La Liga in 2005-2006. In 2006-2007 they were eliminated in the round of the last 16 against LIVERPOOL, and losing the league on head-to-head with Real Madrid. In 2007-2008, Rikjaard's last season, they were knocked out of the semi finals against United, and were 17 points behind La Liga winners Real Madrid. 17 points.

Guardiola took over, and in his first season they won Copa del Rey, Champions League and La Liga, the latter won by 9 points. The next season saw them finishing 3 points ahead of Real, with only one match lost. They were robbed by the ref against Inter in the semi finals, denied several penalties. 10-11 season saw them 4 points ahead of Real, Champions League winners and Copa del Rey winners.

Guardiola took over a team shattered to pieces, brought them together (kicking out Ronaldinho and Deco) and made Barcelona twice as good as they were when we met them under Rikjaard. You can talk about Messi, Xavi, Iniesta and Puyol, but Rikjaard also possessed those players. They may have had the potential under Rikjaard, but Pep utilized their abilities to the maximum by changing a fair amount on the tactical aspect of their game.

Some of you says that he can't switch tactics? Well, he's beaten Real Madrid under Mourinho a lot of times, and each time Mourinho tries something different (which means that Pep does something different). Read this: http://www.zonalmark...elona-tactics/. Pep might not be the right coach for us, but in my opinion he has showed tactical superiority over Mourinho pretty much every time they have met. Pep can't really do anything with his players missing 150% chances, it's not like he can play himself.

Edited May 25, 201214 yr by Ozztheboss

Pep won't work. It's so obvious it's painful.

I don't understand why I'm defending Pep, since I despise their (Barcelona's) players and don't particularly like the football philosophy, but some of you guys really need to get a grip on yourselves.

Barcelona won the Champions League and La Liga in 2005-2006. In 2006-2007 they were eliminated in the round of the last 16 against LIVERPOOL, and losing the league on head-to-head with Real Madrid. In 2007-2008, Rikjaard's last season, they were knocked out of the semi finals against United, and were 17 points behind La Liga winners Real Madrid. 17 points.

Guardiola took over, and in his first season they won Copa del Rey, Champions League and La Liga, the latter won by 9 points. The next season saw them finishing 3 points ahead of Real, with only one match lost. They were robbed by the ref against Inter in the semi finals, denied several penalties. 10-11 season saw them 4 points ahead of Real, Champions League winners and Copa del Rey winners.

Guardiola took over a team shattered to pieces, brought them together (kicking out Ronaldinho and Deco) and made Barcelona twice as good as they were when we met them under Rikjaard. You can talk about Messi, Xavi, Iniesta and Puyol, but Rikjaard also possessed those players. They may have had the potential under Rikjaard, but Pep utilized their abilities to the maximum by changing a fair amount on the tactical aspect of their game.

Some of you says that he can't switch tactics? Well, he's beaten Real Madrid under Mourinho a lot of times, and each time Mourinho tries something different (which means that Pep does something different). Read this: http://www.zonalmark...elona-tactics/. Pep might not be the right coach for us, but in my opinion he has showed tactical superiority over Mourinho pretty much every time they have met. Pep can't really do anything with his players missing 150% chances, it's not like he can play himself.

Thanks for spelling this out. My blood boils every time I see ignorant sh*t about "hurr anyone could win LOADS with Xavi, Iniesta and Messi". Rijkaard had the same resources, whilst Messi wasn't as good he had Ronaldinho and Deco. Rijkaard wasn't a bad manager by any stretch, but Guardiola did some great things for Barca. He's had a huge influence on his best players, pushing Messi into the middle, pioneering the false 9 (SAF picked it up the next season and Rooney was rampant, heh...) and making him achieve things no other footballer has ever done. He's brought out the best in Xavi and Iniesta too.

He might not be the right man for this club, but talking down his achievements or his tactical nous is just stupid.

Edited May 25, 201214 yr by Samdwich

He signed Ibrahimovic, for a world record transfer fee.

No thanks.

Have to say, regarding the talk about Ibrahimovic, I'm far from his biggest fan, but he was actually really good at Barcelona. Scored 16 goals in 29 games and probably got quite a few assists as well. Didn't he score the winning goal in the El Classico as well?

True, he fell out with the management, but, and I can't believe I'm saying this, it wasn't perhaps Peps fault.

I've just defended Ibrahimovic and Guardiola. Will go and wash my mouth with soap now.

Does that not raise the question about whether he's capable of handling more difficult personalities, though? Can you name anyone else he has dealt with who has a personality.... at all? Dani Alves wore a matador's outfit once I guess.

Does that not raise the question about whether he's capable of handling more difficult personalities, though? Can you name anyone else he has dealt with who has a personality.... at all? Dani Alves wore a matador's outfit once I guess.

Eto'o, although their presence at Barca only overlapped by one year.

Does that not raise the question about whether he's capable of handling more difficult personalities, though? Can you name anyone else he has dealt with who has a personality.... at all? Dani Alves wore a matador's outfit once I guess.

Eto'o, Ronaldinho and Deco got the boot pretty fast, Dinho and Deco even before his first pre-season begun. Kicking out Ronaldinho especially would be like AVB throwing out Drogba right away.

With Zlatan, well. I have my own thoughts on that.

Edited May 26, 201214 yr by Ozztheboss

That's kind of my point... he can't deal with them so he kicks them out. To me it just seems like the exact problem AVB had.

He kicks them out and make the team twice as strong as they were when the egos was in the club. Sounds fair to me.

How do we know that AVB wouldn't have achieved the same given more time? Will Pep be given that time? It's a question mark over him no matter how you look at it...

How do we know that AVB wouldn't have achieved the same given more time? Will Pep be given that time? It's a question mark over him no matter how you look at it...

100% agree, my whole points is to show that Pep has balls enough to change the squad and the tactics to the better.

He kicks them out and make the team twice as strong as they were when the egos was in the club. Sounds fair to me.

He kicked Eto out and then look what Mourinho did with him!!!! And Inter!!!!

was it a case of kicking eto'o out or just him wanting Ibrahimovic so much that he was willing to give Eto'o up?

The Zlatan debacle was undoubtedly Pep's biggest mistake, but it's clear why he went for it - Ibrahimovic looked ideal for Barcelona, he's great technically and is big and strong, so he can play their style but also be someone who can get on the end of crosses if a change is needed. Unfortunately Pep didn't account for how much of a c**t he is ("you bought a ferrari and you want to drive it like a ford" or some sh*t about Pep tinkering with his role when he moved Messi into the middle...)

was it a case of kicking eto'o out or just him wanting Ibrahimovic so much that he was willing to give Eto'o up?

The Zlatan debacle was undoubtedly Pep's biggest mistake, but it's clear why he went for it - Ibrahimovic looked ideal for Barcelona, he's great technically and is big and strong, so he can play their style but also be someone who can get on the end of crosses if a change is needed. Unfortunately Pep didn't account for how much of a c**t he is ("you bought a ferrari and you want to drive it like a ford" or some sh*t about Pep tinkering with his role when he moved Messi into the middle...)

Eto'o forced his way out by acting like a twat. I remember a quote from him about how if his name were Etodinho, he'd have won the Ballon d'Or. Absolutely massive ego on that one.

Sadly, Guardiola made the mistake of replacing one egotist with another.