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N'golo Kante - We are not worthy!


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3 minutes ago, Sexyfootball said:

The thing that frustrates me is how reluctant we are to take any sort of shot from outside the box ... you see them do it on the training ground, and then when it comes to a game no-one steps up ... even when the shot is clearly on ...

Its all about playing it safe, taking no risks, safety first football, the entire ethos that Barcelona based their game plan was to never make a risky pass in case you lost possession. Its now how we are playing too, no risk football is tedious and frustrating to watch. 

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27 minutes ago, Sexyfootball said:

The thing that frustrates me is how reluctant we are to take any sort of shot from outside the box ... you see them do it on the training ground, and then when it comes to a game no-one steps up ... even when the shot is clearly on ...

I mean tbf... Kovacic, Jorginho and Kante aren't really known for scoring long range goals. 

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2 minutes ago, Sexyfootball said:

Nor, it appears, is anyone else in the whole squad ... 🙂

Maybe if they actually went to the well, they might get a drink of water ?

Pulisic goes for the shot every now and then. I mean don't get me wrong, I do agree with you, we don't shoot enough. But in all fairness, I don't want Kovacic, Jorginho and Kante trying their luck that much out of the box anyway, not those 3, Kovacic especially, he can't shoot for nuts. 

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2 hours ago, dkw said:

Its all about playing it safe, taking no risks, safety first football, the entire ethos that Barcelona based their game plan was to never make a risky pass in case you lost possession. Its now how we are playing too, no risk football is tedious and frustrating to watch. 

The difference for Barca was Messi had the talent to pull the rabbit out of the hat, and PSG under TT had Neymar and Mbappe! We just don’t have that player since Hazard left.

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42 minutes ago, Wearyourcolours said:

The difference for Barca was Messi had the talent to pull the rabbit out of the hat, and PSG under TT had Neymar and Mbappe! We just don’t have that player since Hazard left.

Yep, as shown by how many times Hazard dragged us to wins under Sarri. We wouldnt have won half the games we did without Hazard that season.

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49 minutes ago, Wearyourcolours said:

The difference for Barca was Messi had the talent to pull the rabbit out of the hat, and PSG under TT had Neymar and Mbappe! We just don’t have that player since Hazard left.

Pulisic was doing it after the restart last season. Boy, I hope he and/or Kai Havertz discover their form. That would make a massive difference to the rest of our season.

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1 hour ago, dkw said:

Yep, as shown by how many times Hazard dragged us to wins under Sarri. We wouldnt have won half the games we did without Hazard that season.

Wasn't just Sarri though. Hazard did that for Mourinho aswell when we won the league. Especially after that 5-3 Spurs game and we shut up shop for the rest of the season. Hazard was winning us games on his own, it was always through his individual brilliance we were creating goals, without him we would've been f**ked. 

Conte it was a bit different, Pedro came into his own and was actually performing to a better standard than Hazard was. 

Pulisic last season was that type of player, he was changing games for us and being the one to rely on, right now we can't rely on him at all and you can tell that's been a big difference this season. 

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30 minutes ago, Slojo said:

Wasn't just Sarri though. Hazard did that for Mourinho aswell when we won the league. Especially after that 5-3 Spurs game and we shut up shop for the rest of the season. Hazard was winning us games on his own, it was always through his individual brilliance we were creating goals, without him we would've been f**ked. 

Conte it was a bit different, Pedro came into his own and was actually performing to a better standard than Hazard was. 

Pulisic last season was that type of player, he was changing games for us and being the one to rely on, right now we can't rely on him at all and you can tell that's been a big difference this season. 

Thats fair, but I always remember that Sarri season being the one where Hazard just dragged us through games seemingly almost on his own, he scores or assisted so many goals to get us points we maybe didnt really earn.

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1 hour ago, Slojo said:

Wasn't just Sarri though. Hazard did that for Mourinho aswell when we won the league. Especially after that 5-3 Spurs game and we shut up shop for the rest of the season. Hazard was winning us games on his own, it was always through his individual brilliance we were creating goals, without him we would've been f**ked. 

Conte it was a bit different, Pedro came into his own and was actually performing to a better standard than Hazard was

Pulisic last season was that type of player, he was changing games for us and being the one to rely on, right now we can't rely on him at all and you can tell that's been a big difference this season. 

I have to disagree with that. Pedro was good for us under Conte, but I don't remember ever thinking that he was playing as well or even better than Hazard. I always thought Hazard played some of his best football under Conte because he didn't have a lot of defensive responsibilty in the 343/352.

Actually looking back at their goals and assists you definetely have a case regarding the 16/17 season (not Contes second season though). Pedro had 9 goals and 10 assists in the league that year whereas Hazard had 16 goals and 5 assists, while playing significantly more and doing less defensively. I would still argue that his ability to hold up the ball and maintain possession thus preventing attacks from breaking down and generally playing a bigger role in our offensive play (not only in direct goals and assists), outweighs Pedros defensive work and gives Hazard the edge, but I can understand if people see it differently.

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Sarri got the best out of Hazard (21goals, 17assists) , Giroud (13 goals 9 assists), Pedro (13 goals, 5 assists) and even Kante (5 goals, 4 assists) in that 1 season, all of them had such a high contribution that was either the highest they have had for us or equal to their highest.

Sarri transformed us from playing 30% possession to 60+ possession like it was nothing and we finished top 3 and won Europa league, his influence is so huge for us.

 

 

NINTCHDBPICT000493740730-e1559168214836.

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Just now, True Blue23 said:

I have to disagree with that. Pedro was good for us under Conte, but I don't remember ever thinking that he was playing as well or even better than Hazard. I always thought Hazard played some of his best football under Conte because he didn't have a lot of defensive responsibilty in the 343/352.

Actually looking back at their goals and assists you definetely have a case regarding the 16/17 season (not Contes second season though). Pedro had 9 goals and 10 assists in the league that year whereas Hazard had 16 goals and 5 assists, while playing significantly more and doing less defensively. I would still argue that his ability to hold up the ball and maintain possession thus preventing attacks from breaking down and generally playing a bigger role in our offensive play (not only in direct goals and assists), outweighs Pedros defensive work and gives Hazard the edge, but I can understand if people see it differently.

I thought Pedro was better that season tbh, Pedro after having a very disappointing first season, came to life under Conte and was outstanding. Hazard was great don't get me wrong, but I thought Pedro has the finishing edge that season, that goal against Everton away that pretty much won us the league was just beautiful, that summed up Pedro's season. 

Overall though you could make an argument Hazard was better, I guess it's a standard thing. With Hazard you always expect greatness, with Pedro it came out of nowhere so perhaps I'm giving more credit to Pedro due to that. 

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3 minutes ago, Gol15 said:

Sarri got the best out of Hazard (21goals, 17assists) , Giroud (13 goals 9 assists), Pedro (13 goals, 5 assists) and even Kante (5 goals, 4 assists) in that 1 season, all of them had such a high contribution that was either the highest they have had for us or equal to their highest.

Sarri transformed us from playing 30% possession to 60+ possession like it was nothing and we finished top 3 and won Europa league, his influence is so huge for us.

 

 

NINTCHDBPICT000493740730-e1559168214836.

I forgot to mention RLC, he also scored the most that season as well. You can argue that this was the shortest time period a team got transformed in the way the play and in their philosophy because Conte and Sarri are like night and day.

I still don't understand how we managed to finish top 3, it was basically the 2 best teams Man City and Liverpool way above everyone else and the team that the first of the rest was us.

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2 minutes ago, Gol15 said:

Sarri got the best out of Hazard (21goals, 17assists) , Giroud (13 goals 9 assists), Pedro (13 goals, 5 assists) and even Kante (5 goals, 4 assists) in that 1 season, all of them had such a high contribution that was either the highest they have had for us or equal to their highest.

Sarri transformed us from playing 30% possession to 60+ possession like it was nothing and we finished top 3 and won Europa league, his influence is so huge for us.

 

 

NINTCHDBPICT000493740730-e1559168214836.

There's a lot of merit to that Gol. I do agree, I think Sarri's football is still carrying over to now (I'm sure many hate that, they have their own reasons for it). We are very comfortable in possession, perhaps too comfortable. We do play it out from the back really well, no matter what a lot of people say. And Frank carried that possession football on and did it well. It was harder for Frank to do since he had to bring in a lot of new young players through the ranks, but I do think Sarri laid the foundations. 

I think in a way, Tuchel is trying to snap the team out of it a bit, so we give up possession more and take the necessary risks. There are positives and negatives though, there are some teams that really struggle to string a few passes together, we aren't one of them that's for sure. But possession doesn't win you games, and it's clear we need to do more with the ball. I had a lot of criticism with Sarri's style, but I do think he deserves more credit on this forum. It is unfair to simply look past Hazard’s contribution and not give the manager any credit for it. 

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5 minutes ago, Gol15 said:

Sarri got the best out of Hazard (21goals, 17assists) , Giroud (13 goals 9 assists), Pedro (13 goals, 5 assists) and even Kante (5 goals, 4 assists) in that 1 season, all of them had such a high contribution that was either the highest they have had for us or equal to their highest.

Sarri transformed us from playing 30% possession to 60+ possession like it was nothing and we finished top 3 and won Europa league, his influence is so huge for us.

 

 

NINTCHDBPICT000493740730-e1559168214836.

I am not a big Sarri fan but I can accept that he was a good Manager and his achievement's with us for the solitary season are hugely underrated however I think his season is underrated due to 3 reasons:

1. Conte - Conte came in and had a huge impact, in my view the biggest impact a new Manager has had in their first full season in the PL, following him was always going to be hard with the standard he set in his first season with us.

2. Sarri using us as a stepping stone- It was fairly clear from early on that Sarri wished to return to Italy, I personally felt he couldn't move directly to Juve from Napoli and used us to navigate his way to Turin.

3. 6-0 Hammering to City - I personally felt it was over at this stage and never really got believing in his methods after that, at that point had their been better alternatives my feeling was he would've been sacked.

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2 minutes ago, Imran_CFC said:

I am not a big Sarri fan but I can accept that he was a good Manager and his achievement's with us for the solitary season are hugely underrated however I think his season is underrated due to 3 reasons:

1. Conte - Conte came in and had a huge impact, in my view the biggest impact a new Manager has had in their first full season in the PL, following him was always going to be hard with the standard he set in his first season with us.

2. Sarri using us as a stepping stone- It was fairly clear from early on that Sarri wished to return to Italy, I personally felt he couldn't move directly to Juve from Napoli and used us to navigate his way to Turin.

3. 6-0 Hammering to City - I personally felt it was over at this stage and never really got believing in his methods after that, at that point had their been better alternatives my feeling was he would've been sacked.

That 6-0 City game was horrible, but I thought the recent Arsenal loss was a lot worse than that. If you look at the team we were playing at the time. So for people that gave up with Sarri due to that game, I don't know how you couldn't give up on Frank after that pitiful Arsenal game. 

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Just now, Slojo said:

That 6-0 City game was horrible, but I thought the recent Arsenal loss was a lot worse than that. If you look at the team we were playing at the time. So for people that gave up with Sarri due to that game, I don't know how you couldn't give up on Frank after that pitiful Arsenal game. 

Again back to Frank

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28 minutes ago, Gol15 said:

Sarri got the best out of Hazard (21goals, 17assists) , Giroud (13 goals 9 assists), Pedro (13 goals, 5 assists) and even Kante (5 goals, 4 assists) in that 1 season, all of them had such a high contribution that was either the highest they have had for us or equal to their highest.

Sarri transformed us from playing 30% possession to 60+ possession like it was nothing and we finished top 3 and won Europa league, his influence is so huge for us.

 

In the interests of a bit of balance, I suppose we should also highlight Sarri's last 18 PL games that season, won 8 drawn 5 lost 5 ... goals 25 and conceded 23, including zero goals in 6 of our last 9 away games, which included the heavy defeats to Bournemouth 4-0 and the aforementioned Man City 6-0 (starting team in both games included Kante and Jorginho)  🙂

Edited by Sexyfootball
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2 minutes ago, Imran_CFC said:

I am not a big Sarri fan but I can accept that he was a good Manager and his achievement's with us for the solitary season are hugely underrated however I think his season is underrated due to 3 reasons:

1. Conte - Conte came in and had a huge impact, in my view the biggest impact a new Manager has had in their first full season in the PL, following him was always going to be hard with the standard he set in his first season with us.

2. Sarri using us as a stepping stone- It was fairly clear from early on that Sarri wished to return to Italy, I personally felt he couldn't move directly to Juve from Napoli and used us to navigate his way to Turin.

3. 6-0 Hammering to City - I personally felt it was over at this stage and never really got believing in his methods after that, at that point had their been better alternatives my feeling was he would've been sacked.

I think that the fact that Sarri left us willingly as soon as Juventus called should be seen as a concerning sign as well and not just a way to simply dislike the man.

Conte was leaving one way or the other and right after him Sarri left basically as soon as he could, the board has no patience and demands much even during a huge transition and the fans have no patience at all. It was a cheeky move to offer the job to Lampard who simply couldn't refuse it, the board might have done it also to cause a publicity stunt - "Look we're not so bad after all, we give to one of our biggest club legends to take over". Only to show no mercy as soon as a bad patch came.

I'm convinced that if we keep doing this there will come a time when only bad managers will be available for us, maybe that time isn't near as there are still some options but it's close, I wouldn't want managers that only look for a nice payment, the club must change some attitudes because we might miss out on giving this new generation of players what they need.

The one manager that seems to have a real vision and that looks to be very special is Nagelsmann but if we look too unstable he might not be willing to join us in a few years anyway.

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4 minutes ago, Sexyfootball said:

In the interests of a bit of balance, I suppose we should also highlight Sarri's last 18 PL games that season, won 8 drawn 5 lost 5 ... goals 25 and conceded 23, including zero goals in 6 of our last 9 away games, which included the heavy defeats to Bournemouth 4-0 and the aforementioned Man City 6-0 (starting team in both games included Kante and Jorginho)  🙂

For me this isn't about any balance issues, I see always people pointing out how we did well because of Hazard but the reason why he did so well is because of his manager. Man City had 30 points over us the season prior to Sarri taking over so the advantage was clear but even so we managed to compete in several instances against them at the time when they were back-to-back PL champions - we won in the PL against them 2:0 and we played a 0:0 in the Cup final only to lose on penalties, so while we did lose 6:0 we showed that we do have some quality even against the very best team at the time, no question about it. In our last 10 games we lost 2 only and Jorginho and Kante played just as well in most of our big wins that season.

This is why I come back to Sarri, because Kante was playing higher up the pitch and Sarri insisted that he can do better in the final third - by the end of the season he had his best goal and assist contributing that he has ever had in his career.
Fast forward a bit and he's put in the base of the midfield where he couldn't influence the game enough but as a sub he made a few appearances playing further up the pitch and there he managed to get a few assists very fast after entering the game.

I think it really matters how a player is used and Kante does have the quality that Tuchel wants - press, ball recovery higher up the pitch or in the final third. But if he keeps being played in the base of the midfield he's just half the player he once was. 

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47 minutes ago, Slojo said:

I thought Pedro was better that season tbh, Pedro after having a very disappointing first season, came to life under Conte and was outstanding. Hazard was great don't get me wrong, but I thought Pedro has the finishing edge that season, that goal against Everton away that pretty much won us the league was just beautiful, that summed up Pedro's season. 

Overall though you could make an argument Hazard was better, I guess it's a standard thing. With Hazard you always expect greatness, with Pedro it came out of nowhere so perhaps I'm giving more credit to Pedro due to that. 

Wasn't that season also that Pedro scored a screamer, similar to the Everton goal, at the Bridge to draw Spurs whom we went then to beat 2-1? That match and season was pure rock and roll, what a feeling at the Bridge.

I have to admit that I wanted Sarri to stay, he did change our playing style, I accepted what he was trying and we managed to get top 3 and beat Arsenal in the EL. But man, it was boring at times at the Bridge or away. The feeling among the fans was of "lets go to the pub before another boring game"... 

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1 hour ago, Sexyfootball said:

In the interests of a bit of balance, I suppose we should also highlight Sarri's last 18 PL games that season, won 8 drawn 5 lost 5 ... goals 25 and conceded 23, including zero goals in 6 of our last 9 away games, which included the heavy defeats to Bournemouth 4-0 and the aforementioned Man City 6-0 (starting team in both games included Kante and Jorginho)  🙂

Sexyfootball are you suggesting Gol15 was being selective in the stats and figures he was using? How very dare you. That's most unlike him!

You have mentioned the 4-0 Bournemouth defeat. What a horror show that was. Probably our worst performance for a decade or more IMO. The thing I remember most about Sarriball is the amount of passes it generally took to move the ball from our box to the halfway line. Only for it to usually come straight back again. And he never committed players forwards in numbers in front of the ball. If we were fortunate enough to eventually move the ball into a dangerous area there was rarely anyone there. They were all behind the ball. It was so booooorrrrriiinngggggg!

The end of that season everything was down to Hazard and the teams around us imploding.

I wouldn't mind seeing Big Samuele Allardycihio in Serie A for a season of two. Maybe he could achieve big things there. Quite a few would probably want him here then if the stats were good.

Edited by just
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2 minutes ago, just said:

Sexyfootball are you suggesting Gol15 was being selective in the stats and figures he was using? How very dare you. That's most unlike him!

You have mentioned the 4-0 Bournemouth defeat. What a horror show that was. Probably our worst performance for a decade or more IMO. The thing I remember most about Sarriball is the amount of passes it generally took to move the ball from our box to the halfway line. Only for it to usually come back again. And he never committed players forwards in numbers in front of the ball. If we were fortunate enough to eventually move the ball into a dangerous area there was rarely anyone there. They were all behind the ball. It was so booooorrrrriiinngggggg!

The end of that season everything was down to Hazard and the teams around us imploding.

I wouldn't seeing Big Samuele Allardycihio in Serie A for a season of two. Maybe he could achieve big things there. Quite a few would probably want him here then.

To be fair to Sarri, his Napoli team looked a lot better than us, so it's probably a case of our players failing or unable to adapt to his style and tactics, rather than the man himself. Possibly lack of time to drill the team was a factor as well. Over in Serie A, it is going to be interesting to see how the Juve fans react when Pirlo fails to deliver the their customary title ... I bet they won't want Sarri back though 🙂

 

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