I reckon apart from City who looks a level about the rest, and probably United if Jose's method starts to kick in, the next 2 spots are dog fights between 5-6 teams. After 3 games, we were 5 points better than Arsenal, 3 games later they have 3 points lead. It's that kind of a league where everything could happen, we win a few games and suddenly we will feel we belong to the top 4 again. It's only 6 games, and some people want sack the owner too, WTF is wrong with people?

One Word: NO.

City, United, Arsenal, Liverpool, Spurs, Everton. I think we will finish 7th. 

1 hour ago, didierforever said:

One Word: NO.

City, United, Arsenal, Liverpool, Spurs, Everton. I think we will finish 7th. 

If we finish below Everton, Conte's sacking will be a well deserved one. I dont think that will happen.

I think we will finish either 4th or 5th.

On 9/27/2016 at 18:05, DonAntonio said:

Like who? A sheikh or an American investment group? What a strange comment, rather ungrateful and way off the mark. 

 Like this

Not way off the mark at all. Look at City. 

of course he can, Man City and Liverpool dont have good defenses, Man United's is pretty average also, plus when Terry and Zouma are back we will obviously be stronger defensively, our issue is that we struggle to control games and we dont make it difficult for other teams to get in the final third and attack us, that is what Conte needs to sort out, as well as adding more of a goal threat in attack, we need to start pressing teams and play with a higher intensity, watching Atleitco last night you can see why they are now the 2nd/3rd best team in the world and easily the best defensive unit in the world, their players work so hard, they close players down so quickly and stay very organised and compact, even Savic who looked awful in the PL now looks like a world class defender at Atletico, we simply need more desire to win that ball back as quickly as we can, and then even our back four with Cahill and Ivanovic would look good, and then Pedro and/or Batshuayi need to be starting we need goals threats in the team they are our two biggest goal threats after Costa, Pedro is someone who will make runs in behind like Costa and someone who can run past Costa when Costa drops off, Willian and Moses just make us more predictable and easier to stop, and then the option of Costa and Batsuayi up front together could work out very well in a 3-5-2

IF Conte can get us to control games better and make it difficult for teams to get up the pitch against us then i dont see any reason why we shouldn't finish top 4 and challenge for the title. i believe Conte is more then capable of sorting those issues out, so i think we will finish top 4.

On 27.09.2016 at 19:01, Orpington_Blue said:

City, United and Arsenal are surely going to get top 4 finish. That leaves just one spot that Chelsea, spurs and dippers are going to fight for.

If Conte can come up with defensive organisation that allows our attackers to do their job freely, we will get top 4.

Dippers are going to get many injuries as a result of klopp's style of play. Its spurs that are the big problem for us.

City and Arsenal are the only guarantees. Also Liverpool look to me to be stronger than United or Tottenham. I would say City, Arsenal and Pool with just one slot for the rest.

No way, there are problems from the top down. We need a new owner that understands football.

Are you serious about that?

I hate this word but this squad is in transisation. Its still largely filled by players that were title winners from 2 years ago, the main problem is form and age has caught up with the majority of the squad.

A big core of our starting side is in their 30's or are pushing on towards 30 and are not being replaced.

The players are staying the same but the manager is being changed, if thats the case the results remain the same, at some point you have to start laying the questions towards the players.

I hope the club doesnt sack Conte because we start the transfer window very well and then stalled for weeks and end up re-signing Luiz and getting over the line with little defensive improvement. The board have to realise, in the current climate with Utd and City spending 200m, if you're not getting close to matching them, you'll have no hope keeping up with them and not backing Conte on his options at CB looks to have cost the club this year.

Maybe we'll turn it around and be in the top 4, its only 6 games in so I wouldnt write any team off at this stage but for us, the signs arent great, two abject performances against what we'd consider rivals and we've stumbled towards wins against Watford and West Ham, we were in complete control against Swansea but kept missing chances and very nearly lost the game. We've only been comfortable against Burnley and Bristol Rovers which is worrying but I have faith, that of the board see sense and back Conte, we'll be back in the near future to where we should be.

Edited September 29, 20169 yr by Delnino

Its very early days. 

This squad just reeks of complacency in my opinion. I just don't get a sense of hunger, intensity, and desire from a lot of our players. Costa can drive me nuts sometimes but at least he plays with fire. I think we could use some more grit in our squad.

 

As far as conte goes- I think he's the right man. His passion is unquestionable and I believe he has a footballing brain to go with it. 

2 hours ago, Zola said:

Its very early days. 

It sure is, and its pretty poor seeing people already giving up on the bloody season this early. 

4 hours ago, stevo said:

Not way off the mark at all. Look at City. 

So you contest that sheikh mansoor knows more about football than Roman Abramovic ? I'll tell you what sheikh mansoor did he brought in a Better board who understand the task and I have said for a while now our structure including people like Emenalo need to move on, but the owner? Are you serious? You compared city, tell me who has been more successful over the last 10 years? 

Standard bud, only ever year it gets earlier in the season, next year it might only be 3 games before people give up! 

2 hours ago, edewaarb said:

This squad just reeks of complacency in my opinion. I just don't get a sense of hunger, intensity, and desire from a lot of our players. Costa can drive me nuts sometimes but at least he plays with fire. I think we could use some more grit in our squad.

 

As far as conte goes- I think he's the right man. His passion is unquestionable and I believe he has a footballing brain to go with it. 

Complacency and players just not good enough anymore also some of the players just don't want to be here.

7 minutes ago, Zola said:

Standard bud, only ever year it gets earlier in the season, next year it might only be 3 games before people give up! 

Pretty pathetic isnt it, calling our season over now. Some our fans just love to moan it seems, and will disappear should the season pick up.

9 minutes ago, Zola said:

Standard bud, only ever year it gets earlier in the season, next year it might only be 3 games before people give up! 

Pre season in the USA next

On 9/28/2016 at 08:53, wallosh said:

If we don't have the quality to finish top 4 above Tothenham, Everton and Liverpool then we have the wrong manager. Roman spending more money won't solve that because most of our players will walk straight into the starting lineup of those teams.

That is a ridiculous thing to say. Just wrong on so many levels. I can´t even wrap my head around it.

Just look at our defenders for starters. Do I really need to highlight how weak our squad has become in comparison to previous years????

I have no idea whether we can get top 4 right now. The entire situation at the club just completely confuses me these days. On paper we have a title challenging squad, but whether they play like champions or like relegation candidates seems to be the flip of a coin, and it doesn't seem to matter whether we're playing against top 4 rivals or bottom 4 crap either when it comes to what the result will be. There seems to be a really deeply implanted problem in the side, and switching managers and even bringing in new players doesn't seem to resolve it.  I was hoping Conte would be the fresh broom needed to sweep away the problems, but his subsitution policy and the absolutely abject nature of our last few games leaving me wondering if he can actually achieve the changes we need, whether because of behind the scenes pressures or because he simply doesn't know what the real issue is. Does anyone anymore?

Conte is the right man for the job imo. Even if Chelsea dont get top 4 this season I would doubt its because of him. Chelsea simply don't have a squad good enough.

However i do find it very frustrating that we are not playing more youth. Is Chalobah really going to offer us less than Matic is at the moment? Is Aina going to make our defense worse than Ivan is? 

19 minutes ago, Radford10 said:

Conte is the right man for the job imo. Even if Chelsea dont get top 4 this season I would doubt its because of him. Chelsea simply don't have a squad good enough.

However i do find it very frustrating that we are not playing more youth. Is Chalobah really going to offer us less than Matic is at the moment? Is Aina going to make our defense worse than Ivan is? 

I think (and hope) that we are going to see some youngsters in the next game.

Would love to see Aina and Dave as our full backs, chalobah and rlc either side of kante`, and batshuay up front with costa

6 hours ago, Kentonio said:

I have no idea whether we can get top 4 right now. The entire situation at the club just completely confuses me these days. On paper we have a title challenging squad, but whether they play like champions or like relegation candidates seems to be the flip of a coin, and it doesn't seem to matter whether we're playing against top 4 rivals or bottom 4 crap either when it comes to what the result will be. There seems to be a really deeply implanted problem in the side, and switching managers and even bringing in new players doesn't seem to resolve it.  I was hoping Conte would be the fresh broom needed to sweep away the problems, but his subsitution policy and the absolutely abject nature of our last few games leaving me wondering if he can actually achieve the changes we need, whether because of behind the scenes pressures or because he simply doesn't know what the real issue is. Does anyone anymore?

1. Our squad does not look good enough to challenge for the title. Not even close since City, Utd, Tottenham and even Arsenal are better on paper.

2. We have not brought in anyone meaningful except Kante and maybe Luiz. That is not enough and truly speaks volumes about how much we have regressed from former days. 

3. What we see since Mourinho left is all this squad is capable of. Fighting to stay close to a top-4 finish but not quite getting there.

4. There is no deeply implanted problem. Our players are simply not good enough to be a truly top-class side. What is more worrying than that is that the management doesn´t seem to have the funds or willingness to do something about it. 

Club just need to everything they can to stay close in the top four. I have a feeling everything will be better after January transfer window. But if we slide before that, it will be too late. But in Conte I trust.

5 hours ago, Radford10 said:

Conte is the right man for the job imo. Even if Chelsea dont get top 4 this season I would doubt its because of him. Chelsea simply don't have a squad good enough.

However i do find it very frustrating that we are not playing more youth. Is Chalobah really going to offer us less than Matic is at the moment? Is Aina going to make our defense worse than Ivan is? 

 

 

That is Abramovich will give him free reign on signing new players. I think Luiz returned not because of Conte's plan but because of Abramovich.

On 9/28/2016 at 02:42, Coxy15 said:

At least we were a Champions League regular and title-challenging club at the time of most of those appointments

This

I'm sure some would take the job despite our record of sacking managers but top guys wouldn't think twice if we have another 10th place finish, no Europe and a team that has decayed another season. Simeone in particular will have his pick of clubs when he is ready to move on. If Klopp doesn't get it going this season he could be on the chopping block, Wenger is inching toward retirement as well. 

 

I for one am perfectly happy with Conte, we did well hiring him. Its the players who are behind this rough patch, not the manager

12 hours ago, reparto corse said:

1. Our squad does not look good enough to challenge for the title. Not even close since City, Utd, Tottenham and even Arsenal are better on paper.

2. We have not brought in anyone meaningful except Kante and maybe Luiz. That is not enough and truly speaks volumes about how much we have regressed from former days. 

3. What we see since Mourinho left is all this squad is capable of. Fighting to stay close to a top-4 finish but not quite getting there.

4. There is no deeply implanted problem. Our players are simply not good enough to be a truly top-class side. What is more worrying than that is that the management doesn´t seem to have the funds or willingness to do something about it. 

I disagree with this completely. We have extremely high quality players on paper, and our squad is certainly more than a match for the likes of Arsenal, Tottenham and probably United. This is basically the exact same squad that 2 seasons ago crushed the Premiership for half a season playing some of the most beautiful football in our clubs history. Those players have not suddenly become rubbish. Despite his inconsistency, Eden Hazard is still the best player in the Premier League, Courtois still one of the top 5 keepers in the world, Costa still one of the best strikers on the planet. We've now also brought in probably last years player of the league in Kante and a defender who despite his comical moments has twice changed hands for vast amounts because of his consumate ball playing skills and talent. Not to mention of course a left (right) back who would walk into basically any team in the premier league, a DM/CM who before last year was the best in the league, and players of vast quality like Willian, Oscar and Pedro.

And thats why this current malaise is so damn confusing, it's tempting to fall back on the idea that our squad just isn't very good, but its simply not true. Two years ago this was a title winning squad of vast talent and potential, who in the space of a single season appears to have completely lost its way. Mourinho is good but he's not a magician, he didn't magically turn bad players into a great team. There is a great team here somewhere just waiting to be found, but the question now becomes whether that is still achievable or whether some combination of group dynamics has resulted in a group that can no longer operate together effectively.