Costa should take a break, he had so many chances but I feel like he is too scared to score and ended up losing a possession and slow the game down.y

Chelsea biggest strength is fast counter attack and this season we are abysmal at that.

I thought we actually did pretty well today. No way deserved to lose, created some decent chances and how that wasnt a penalty and a red card I'll never know! I definitely dont buy in to Jose's everyone is against us rubbish but that was a shocking decision.

 

But yeah, I can tolerate defeats like that when the team are trying (not including Fabregas, he was a disgrace as usual) and we did actually play quite well. It's the defeats where we dont even look bothered or leave our own half like v Liverpool that grate the most. I dont see any way we make the top 4 now, we aren't suddenly going to turn brilliant over night and we'll need a brilliant points per game over the rest of the season to even get 70 points now!! So try some kids out ffs.

Fabregas was nowhere near as bad as some are making out. He was an upgrade on Ramires whose passing ability is abysmal.

Thought fabregas done well whem he came on tbh. That ball to costa was brilliant and last year costa would of buried it

Why cant we create anything from.open play?

Players aren't running on the overlap.

Players aren't running beyond the last man.

By not doing these basic things it's making us so easy to defend against.

Players keep wanting the ball to feet on the edge of the area and then don't look to beat their man.

We aren't stretching defences but all of this is so basic and I'm lost why we aren't doing these things.

Fabregas is a tremendous passer of the ball but if he's got no one to aim a through ball at what's he supposed to do? He's not going to run past players and scores 30 yard screamers.

Costa is clearly frustrated, he's sometimes dropping as deep as the half way line looking for the ball because the service from midfield is abysmal.

I don't understand how and why players as talented as the ones we have are incapable of doing something as basic as making a run towards the near post.

There's only so much Jose can do, once the players step onto the pitch they're the ones who are meant to do their jobs and the attackers in particular are failing miserably and frankly they should be ashamed of themselves.

This was our offense in a nutshell today. We had 4 or 5 players lined up on the edge of the box for some reason and nobody at all in it. You dont break thier defense down like that. Not enough pace on the pitch to stretch them at all either. We beat them a few times at the back post on crosses but that seemed to stop in the 2nd half.

At this rate I wouldnt mind playing Stoke-ball and hoping to win 1-0 every week

Unlucky ... Full stop ... deserved a point, at least.

The physicality of the Stoke players is quite telling ...

Every single time they play us, don't matter who the ref is they get away with murder ...

Only grumbles ... We need to try alternatives up front to Costa ... his scoring consistently days are well and truly over.

Rambo terrible ... apart from the very occasional amazing game he's mostly very poor ... should never have been offered a Contract extension...

Edited November 7, 201510 yr by cfcblue

Costa now has the agility of an oil tanker. What the hell has happened to him. People talk about him not having the same opportunities as last season but he's never in the box sniffing around. Last season he was just there when we needed him, it was just instinctive.

Remember how last season we all said he was what we had been missing for a few years - well he's now gone missing. I wish I had the answer. Costa just looks unfit whereas I feel sorry for Hazard who is trying but just low on confidence.

How can we keep claiming to be unlucky? It's just excuses, end of the day were just not good enough right now

Where do we go from here?  Costa looks shot already, need to start Remy.

Where do we go from here? Costa looks shot already, need to start Remy.

The big problem for me is as Champions we didn't just stand still we actually lost quality in Cech & Luis and the personality of Drogba too. We needed to build, we should have signed a striker who could push Diego Costa for one aswell as a few others. I think to many of the players have gutted to comfortable.

If only...

Fabregas was nowhere near as bad as some are making out. He was an upgrade on Ramires whose passing ability is abysmal.

 

In terms of the team dynamic I think they're both as bad as each other in their own unique way. Rami's inept passing ability may be tolerable to some, but i've lost count of the number of times our attacking play breaks down with him. Fabregas is just Fabregas, if he had Verratti or Suarez's instinctive game intelligence he'd be some player, but he doesn't. Both Ramires and Fabregas (along with Diego and Hazard, a slow JT, etc) epitomise everything that is wrong about this team at the mo. I'm by no means saying we should sell (who would be willing to buy at market value is another question all together), but if we're to challenge for anything the core of this team needs to undergo a massive transformation imo (i'd argue even Matic needs to go). If no changes are made I'd put my mortgage on us winning f**k all for the next 3 years.

Edited November 7, 201510 yr by the special one

five things ive learnt from this season

1 as i said on weds costa not good enough,but nor are any of our forwards

2 baba not good enough who ever scouted him for 20 odd million needs shooting

3 bergovic a good no2 but is not a no1 keeper

4 we are easy to play against our wide men dont get to the byeline enough,our fullbacks just do not overlap so teams just sit deep and hit us on the break

5 we are crap

Diego Costa: Chelsea striker steward complaint resolved

Diego Costa is unlikely to face further action following a touchline incident which led to a Stoke City steward alleging he had been assaulted.

The complaint was made after the Chelsea striker, 27, appeared to make contact with the steward's foot while retrieving the ball for a throw-in.

However, the matter, which a Chelsea spokesman described as "utter nonsense", has now been resolved.

The Premier League champions were beaten 1-0 at the Britannia Stadium.

Marko Arnautovic scored the winner in a match where Costa was involved in a number of clashes with Stoke defenders.

He was not punished for any of them by the referee Anthony Taylor, but the official will mention the incident with the steward in his match report.

Fabregas was nowhere near as bad as some are making out. He was an upgrade on Ramires whose passing ability is abysmal.

Completely agree.

Until the misplaced pass where Stoke should of probably scored, he looked decent. People are complaining about him losing the ball but that's because he was trying to get Costa, Remy and Hazard through.

He's been the team's scapegoat this season.

five things ive learnt from this season

1 as i said on weds costa not good enough,but nor are any of our forwards

2 baba not good enough who ever scouted him for 20 odd million needs shooting

3 bergovic a good no2 but is not a no1 keeper

4 we are easy to play against our wide men dont get to the byeline enough,our fullbacks just do not overlap so teams just sit deep and hit us on the break

5 we are crap

1.Agree

2.Agree

3.Mmm

4.Agree

5 . Don't agree (though I think that was tongue in cheek)

What chances? Costa's tame shot from a tight angle? What Hazard chances?

We had just four shots on target all game and I'm fairly sure two of those were Matic pot shots from range.

I'm surprised at people praising another performance where we lost.

Keep playing like we did today and we're in serious trouble.

Right just watched it again on motd to make sure I wasn't going crazy. 7 chances we had and they didn't even show the costa chance near the end when fabregas put him in over the top I suggest you do likewise

Thought we were unlucky and it was one of them performances that just didn't go our way. Do you remember Begovic making ANY saves apart from the odd one or two? We look solid and back to normal levels.

We desperately need to work on our attacking game. We are so predictable and slow. I lost count the amount of times we passed it around the 18 yard line and did nothing with it.

Let's hope we can turning some of these decent/good performances into wins. We really need points.

Oh, Cesc was decent when he came on. Don't be so harsh.

It was more of the same really, the only difference I see is Ivanovic isnt out there getting completely skinned 4-5 times a game. Otherwise its still the same ineptude going forward. Slow passing, no runs, no movement off the ball, no creativity, complete inability to bypass pressure by the central midfield and a defense thats sh*tting itself every time the ball happens to get close to our 16 yard box. We didnt deserve to lose, but with the confidence level of some of our players it was hardly a shock. Mourinho should just play the kids from here on out. Get all of them on. Aina, RLC, Traore and Kennedy atleast if we lose we can say we are playing someone from the academy

We didn't deserve to lose but we need something better up front, I've had enough of big fat Costa

 

Diego Costa: Chelsea striker steward complaint resolved

Diego Costa is unlikely to face further action following a touchline incident which led to a Stoke City steward alleging he had been assaulted.

The complaint was made after the Chelsea striker, 27, appeared to make contact with the steward's foot while retrieving the ball for a throw-in.

However, the matter, which a Chelsea spokesman described as "utter nonsense", has now been resolved.

...

 

 

 

Common sense prevails.

 

Guessing someone had a word with him and told him that he looked petty, that it probably wouldn't get far in court and that he'd have a few months of hell via social media.

Just watched it as live without knowing the score...ffs, when will we catch a fcuking break?

And yet, why do we keep slowing the game down in final third? Why do we keep,passing the ball for passings sake - too many unnecessary passes? Why do we get so few players in the box? How is a cross going to find one man in between five six defenders?

And yet, how the fcuk did we lose to this sh*t Stoke side for a second time in just over a week...oh of course one of their only attacks the ball deflects perfectly off Zouma into the Stoke players path to score...at the other end that would deflect wide of our man...

I just feel this season is jinxed for some reason...even when we play well by this seasons standards we lose..

Thought we played some decent stuff at times. Pedro and Hazard were lively first-half in support of Costa who is getting his mojo back. Just needs to find that killer instinct in front of goal - although Costa’s not the only one. Saying that, Stoke defended well to deny us.

Midfield is still a problem with Ramires and Matic just not up to the demands. And I'm not convinced that Baba is in any way an upgrade on Luis. Or even Ryan Bertrand. He had a torrid time against a skilful winger.

The league is a write off so we''re just playing for self-respect now. But even that's not enough to beat the likes of Stoke.

There's always the Champions League I suppose...

Edited November 8, 201510 yr by Socrates

Those saying Remy should have left his foot in to make sure he 'won' a penalty...have you been watching refs with us the last two seasons? We won't get a pen in a million years, even if someone hacks one of our players down with a scythe and takes someone's legs off.

And by the way, taylor is the w**ker who booked Fabregas for diving at Southampton last season...so you can be sure that was on the players' minds...basically we're fcuked if we do, fcuked if we don't

Edited November 8, 201510 yr by The Brit

Unless we change something drastically in attack, we are going to struggle to draw games let alone win any.

 

We can't carry on assuming that we need to tighten up at the back to stop being defeated. If we could score more goals and relieve the pressure a bit, the clean sheets will come again. I thought Begovic could of saved their goal today, he seemed to get his hand to it.

 

If we get more people in the box the goals will come, Remy and Traore as a two pronged attack has got to be worth a punt, at the very least they will give defenders something to think about, instead of literally nobody to mark.