There is no doubting that Michy can score goals. However he is not the type of striker that suits our style of play. He is not a "back to goal" striker. You only have to look back on this thread and the match day threads to see what many posters thought of him in a Chelsea shirt.

Edited February 16, 20188 yr by Osgood is Good

59 minutes ago, Floyd25 said:

No, I'm not saying he's no good, on the contrary I said he deserves to be given another chance next season. But when he has played against top opposition, he hasn't exactly cut it, it could be a confidence issue, due to lack of game time, or perhaps he's not quite Chelsea level yet. I'm saying don't get overexcited due to performances in what is, with all due respect an inferior league, but no doubt this will be good for his confidence, I hope he lights it up for us next season, if we don't sell him. Agree with you on Baka, he's been the stand out weakest performer this season, but I don't get the comparison in game time, different positions, numerous injuries in midfield etc...

I know they're different positions and all, but Conte has shown a similar distrust of Drinkwater. He has persisted with Bakayoko and left Drinkwater on the bench even when he's fit. Drinkwater is not a world-beater, but I feel he is far better than Bakayoko, and much less error-prone. This makes me believe Conte has favorites and refuses to give adequate chances to players he deems not to fit his style. 

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Edited February 16, 20188 yr by yorkleyblue

7 minutes ago, TomCFC85 said:

Just to be clear, I'm far from denying that Ivan wasn't an amazing player for us and his inclusion in the starting 11 was warranted at first. It's just I'm saying his continuous poor performances that season only highlighted Jose's stubbornness to change tactics or give someone else a chance. 

Not disagreeing with you Tom, I just find it amusing that people in here think that that was solely because Ivanovic was Jose's mate and gave him sweets for his kids, or some such bollocks.

Stubbornness or inability to change tactics, yes, just because he liked Branna, no.  

The whole squad really put in poor performances that year.  Were they all picked despite that just because Mourinho liked them all?

1 minute ago, yorkleyblue said:

Not disagreeing with you Tom, I just find it amusing that people in here think that that was solely because Ivanovic was Jose's mate and gave him sweets for his kids, or some such bollocks.

Stubbornness or inability to change tactics, yes, just because he liked Branna, no.  

The whole squad really put in poor performances that year.  Were they all picked despite that just because Mourinho liked them all?

Fair enough, I think I'm on the same page as you now. 

6 minutes ago, TheSage said:

I know they're different positions and all, but Conte has shown a similar distrust of Drinkwater. He has persisted with Bakayoko and left Drinkwater on the bench even when he's fit. Drinkwater is not a world-beater, but I feel he is far better than Bakayoko, and much less error-prone. This makes me believe Conte has favorites and refuses to give adequate chances to players he deems not to fit his style. 

Just out of interest, is it that he has favourites, or is it that some players don't fit his style?

My god... did i read it right? That there is no personal preference!!!???

What a load of bull!!! Give me one field in the world where personal feelings and preferences dont affect the decision making.

There is always people you prefer. You can end up calling it "loyalty" but there was absolutely no reason to continue playing Ivanovic 20 games into the season. 

Personal bias is an obvious and a very prevalent thing. Not playing michy, rather playing a false 9 with hazard who clearly is not comfortable with the position is a result of personal bias. It hardly makes our team better but conte continued to do so.

22 minutes ago, yorkleyblue said:

so you have to start for anyone to judge how you play, is that it?

So you think it's fair to judge a player who might play 10mins, 5mins or 10seconds against the big teams specially if your chasing games, ffs.Thats a really fair way to judge a player against the big teams .

2 minutes ago, yorkleyblue said:

Just out of interest, is it that he has favourites, or is it that some players don't fit his style?

Both. His favorites will be the players he feels "fit his style", no matter how mediocre ( eg,  Bakayoko )

6 minutes ago, Ernie_blue said:

So you think it's fair to judge a player who might play 10mins, 5mins or 10seconds against the big teams specially if your chasing games, ffs.Thats a really fair way to judge a player against the big teams .

Also, if I'm not mistaken, the only big game he started was Arsenal, and Conte's record against Wenger has been mediocre, regardless of which striker he plays

3 minutes ago, didierforever said:

My god... did i read it right? That there is no personal preference!!!???

What a load of bull!!! Give me one field in the world where personal feelings and preferences dont affect the decision making.

There is always people you prefer. You can end up calling it "loyalty" but there was absolutely no reason to continue playing Ivanovic 20 games into the season. 

Personal bias is an obvious and a very prevalent thing. Not playing michy, rather playing a false 9 with hazard who clearly is not comfortable with the position is a result of personal bias. It hardly makes our team better but conte continued to do so.

Are you seriously saying that a manager whose multi-million pound salary depends on results and results alone would risk all of that purely because he "liked" someone?

I quite like one of my team at work, we get one really well, but he doesn't get all the easy jobs because of that. As I said before, Ivanovich was continually picked by a manager who appeared to have run out of either ideas or enthusiasm at the time, but Ivanovic was far from the only poor performer that season.

I've forgotten how many times Conte has played a false 9 but I do know that we have only lost one of those and have scored 3 or more without reply in many of them.  I can't see that it is a personal bias, even though I know you like to find something to take offence at wherever you can, but more a use of the best players for any given situation, and I think that Conte has looked at Batshuayi and found that for every Brighton performance he turns in, there are several Palace-level performances.  Not personal, pragmatic.

10 minutes ago, Ernie_blue said:

So you think it's fair to judge a player who might play 10mins, 5mins or 10seconds against the big teams specially if your chasing games, ffs.Thats a really fair way to judge a player against the big teams .

I can only judge on what I see.  People in here (including you) are all too happy to judge Willian or Pedro regardless of whether they start, or are substitutes.  Why not Michy?

10 minutes ago, TheSage said:

Both. His favorites will be the players he feels "fit his style", no matter how mediocre ( eg,  Bakayoko )

So, is that personal favouritism or using the players that fit the style and tactics you as the manager want to use?

3 minutes ago, yorkleyblue said:

I can only judge on what I see.  People in here (including you) are all too happy to judge Willian or Pedro regardless of whether they start, or are substitutes.  Why not Michy?

I was replying to the earlier message of judging a player against the big teams, well it will help if he bloody played in them. It's easy to judge Willian who has been at the club many years and played many games but will never improve, be the same stop go player and will turn up against Hull because he normally does. A good squad player yes but Chelsea need to upgrade to the extra level to be better going forward, you won't see me just saying that but many.

To judge a player for a few mins against the big teams when you will either be pushing for a goal against a packed defence or when you are defending and you are most likely on your own isn't really a fair judgement. Now if someone said they judged Batman on his overall performances then fair enough he hasn't been good enough but at the same time he hasn't been given the games.

4 minutes ago, yorkleyblue said:

So, is that personal favouritism or using the players that fit the style and tactics you as the manager want to use?

When your team is crapping the bed, you should be flexible enough to try others. I don't mind him picking players to fit his style, but when some of those players are unbelievably bad, he should be open to trying others or adjusting. You seem to be fixated on whether it's favoritism or choosing players to fit his style. It could be both. Choosing favorites or players you deem to fit your style is all well and good when the team is doing well. When things are not going well, you should show some flexibility

Just now, TheSage said:

When your team is crapping the bed, you should be flexible enough to try others. I don't mind him picking players to fit his style, but when some of those players are unbelievably bad, he should be open to trying others or adjusting. You seem to be fixated on whether it's favoritism or choosing players to fit his style. It could be both. Choosing favorites or players you deem to fit your style is all well and good when the team is doing well. When things are not going well, you should show some flexibility

Drinkwater has played in a midfield 2 for years so should suit Conte's tactics.

4 minutes ago, Ernie_blue said:

I was replying to the earlier message of judging a player against the big teams, well it will help if he bloody played in them. It's easy to judge Willian who has been at the club many years and played many games but will never improve, be the same stop go player and will turn up against Hull because he normally does. A good squad player yes but Chelsea need to upgrade to the extra level to be better going forward, you won't see me just saying that but many.

To judge a player for a few mins against the big teams when you will either be pushing for a goal against a packed defence or when you are defending and you are most likely on your own isn't really a fair judgement. Now if someone said they judged Batman on his overall performances then fair enough he hasn't been good enough but at the same time he hasn't been given the games.

When he has played against relegation sides, he has not been good enough, so why would he warrant a starting place against a top 6 team when he couldn't do it against relegation sides.

23 minutes ago, yorkleyblue said:

Are you seriously saying that a manager whose multi-million pound salary depends on results and results alone would risk all of that purely because he "liked" someone?

I quite like one of my team at work, we get one really well, but he doesn't get all the easy jobs because of that. As I said before, Ivanovich was continually picked by a manager who appeared to have run out of either ideas or enthusiasm at the time, but Ivanovic was far from the only poor performer that season.

I've forgotten how many times Conte has played a false 9 but I do know that we have only lost one of those and have scored 3 or more without reply in many of them.  I can't see that it is a personal bias, even though I know you like to find something to take offence at wherever you can, but more a use of the best players for any given situation, and I think that Conte has looked at Batshuayi and found that for every Brighton performance he turns in, there are several Palace-level performances.  Not personal, pragmatic.

So are you telling me that Conte thought that Morata was a better striker for chelsea than Costa, because that sure as hell was "PERSONAL".

It was a personal decision from Conte to sell off Costa and buy morata, I honestly cant think any other way about it. And that sure as hell looks like a poor decision at least for his near future at the club.

As for Jose, "run out of ideas and enthusiasm", "loyalty to a player", etc etc... I see them as mere excuses. Fact is he simply did not drop him when he should clearly have done so, dozens of games ago, that too. We had a lot of players who performed poorly that season, but Ivanovic was the worst of the lot. He got skinned week in and week out, even against bang average wingers.

Well, just out of the top of my head are the watford and bournemouth defeats in which we played the false 9 and looked utterly toothless. So well... 

Edited February 16, 20188 yr by didierforever

Just now, Osgood is Good said:

When he has played against relegation sides, he has not been good enough, so why would he warrant a starting place against a top 6 team when he couldn't do it against relegation sides.

Ffs, I will explain this again, when someone says they judge a player from the games against the big teams, if he doesn't start or get many mins then how can you judge?

Batman starting those games is an entirely different point and he shouldn't if your main striker is fit and ready to go, Batman was only signed to be backup.

Simple enough.

1 minute ago, didierforever said:

So are you telling me that Conte thought that Morata was a better striker for chelsea than Costa, because that sure as hell was "PERSONAL".

It was a personal decision from Conte to sell off Costa and buy morata, I honestly cant think any other way about it. And that sure as hell looks like a poor decision at least for his near future at the club.

As for Jose, "run out of ideas and enthusiasm", "loyalty to a player", etc etc... I see them as mere excuses. Fact is he simply did not drop him when he should clearly have done so, dozens of games ago, that too. We had a lot of players who performed poorly that season, but Ivanovic was the worst of the lot. He got skinned week in and week out, even against bang average wingers.

Well, just out of the top of my head are the watford and bournemouth defeats in which we played the false 9 and looked utterly toothless. So well... 

I would say Baka is personal, he should have been out the team ages ago but he was continuously being picked, I'm sure the most out of form player in the squad will be picked for Barca.

15 minutes ago, Ernie_blue said:

Ffs, I will explain this again, when someone says they judge a player from the games against the big teams, if he doesn't start or get many mins then how can you judge?

Batman starting those games is an entirely different point and he shouldn't if your main striker is fit and ready to go, Batman was only signed to be backup.

Simple enough.

Ffs I will explain it again, he hasn't shown any reason to start against the top 6, because he hasn't done it against the relegation sides.

Simple enough. 

 

1 hour ago, Ernie_blue said:

Of course it's not, if he hasn't started against the big teams how can you make a point of judging him against the big teams 

There's a reason he didn't start against the top teams. Let's not suddenly pretend that he looked excellent when he did start games. You could argue he should have been given more minutes against top sides, but when he did come on and play against them, he didn't exactly light it up. There's a reason he's on loan and it was the right decision at the time.

Edited February 16, 20188 yr by Floyd25

"But when he has played against top opposition, he hasn't exactly cut it"

There you go, you should go back to the start. The point is when has he started against top teams? If he hasn't then it's an unfair judgement to make from a few mins here and there.

Whether he should start against the top 6 is a TOTALY different point, he shouldn't if your main forward it fit.

1 minute ago, Floyd25 said:

There's a reason he didn't start against the top teams. Let's not suddenly pretend that he looked excellent when he did start games.

So you couldn't make your judgement of him against the top teams then 

28 minutes ago, Ernie_blue said:

So you couldn't make your judgement of him against the top teams then 

My original comment was, when he played against top teams, not when he started against top teams and when he did come on and play against them, he looked out of his depth at times. Now he's performing well for Dortmund, some of you've want to pretend otherwise. I stand my point, loan move was the correct call, listen, I hope he comes back next season full of confidence and kills it. 

Edited February 16, 20188 yr by Floyd25