3 hours ago, The Leigh Limpet said:

Not that it will make a difference, but they have Man Utd at home ( not away ) after the London derbies. Although they have more away games, this will probably suit their game better, as there will be more space to exploit.
Bottom line is, we have an easier finish to the season, and I still think we're win the League with a few points to spare.

 

I just hope the players don't think it is an easy finish. Such thoughts is likely how a garbage team like palace did us at home. I will change my tune on them if they get a result against Spurs but they are more likely to come away with a a 0-4 loss making our defeat to them look all the more poor. 

Let's hope we used up all our bad lucks in this game, last minute injury, hand ball resulted goal, GK injury ( Courtois does seems to break down a lot for a GK). We are knew the depth is a huge issue in the team, we lost a game when without Moses, this time we lost without Alonso. With Costa was doing some personal duels on the field, we are already playing with 10. United did their thing, but on that day probably half of the team would have beaten us, so Jose please slow down with the coaching manual on how to beat Chelsea. Good shout for the referee, even without talking about the handball, he's happy to blow the whistle every time our players stick a foot in, and wave it away when the United players did the same, talk about levelling up the play field, well played!

Painful defeat, but no pain no gain, I expect improvement in the final 6 games.

Edited April 18, 20179 yr by icecoolguy22

On 17/04/2017 at 02:54, Barrettinator said:

Not sure how we're supposed to beat Spurs this weekend with Costa playing up top. He's worse than being a man down. FFS even Torres was decent with his link up play.

He really, really wasn't. Some of you are forgetting just how bad Torres was. 

1 hour ago, Argo said:

He really, really wasn't. Some of you are forgetting just how bad Torres was. 

Oh he was bad. Bad at finishing. Awfully terrible at it. But he wasn't terrible at passing the ball. At some point, he had more assists than goals, didn't he? He certainly wasn't as bad with his link up play as Costa currently is.

This 'playing a man down' meme is fast becoming my most hated footballing cliche. Costa could sit in the center circle for 90 minutes and it would still be better than playing with 10 men because a defender is always going to be wondering if he was gonna stand up or not.

11 minutes ago, Barrettinator said:

Oh he was bad. Bad at finishing. Awfully terrible at it. But he wasn't terrible at passing the ball. At some point, he had more assists than goals, didn't he? He certainly wasn't as bad with his link up play as Costa currently is.

He had a brief purple patch of assists (bang in the middle of a 24 game goal drought funnily enough)  but beyond that nothing much , he wasn't even that great a passer even in his prime. 

Eto'o was the one who was good at passing and linking the play up, his contributions during his season here were hugely underplayed and underappreciated (can't believe some thought he was inferior to Nando) in fact if we had 13/14 Eto'o in this squad then Costa would be dropped. 

3 minutes ago, Argo said:

He had a brief purple patch of assists (bang in the middle of a 24 game goal drought funnily enough)  but beyond that nothing much , he wasn't even that great a passer even in his prime. 

Eto'o was the one who was good at passing and linking the play up, his contributions during his season here were hugely underplayed and underappreciated (can't believe some thought he was inferior to Nando) in fact if we had 13/14 Eto'o in this squad then Costa would be dropped. 

Says a lot about Costa's form that an old Eto'o would outperform him right now. Really can't stand him anymore. Needs to f**k off to China asap.

Lots of talk about the run in and how spurs are going to drop points, and we've got the easier run in. In my opinion that's bollox. Where are they gonna drop points? They are buzzing and playing good football. We look lost and with that complete prat we have up front who really doesn't give a f**k about Chelsea I'm really concerned. We will be in cl next year which is as much as we hoped for at the start of the season. Hopefully I've got it all totally wrong. Will never stop loving this club, but at the moment aaaaaaaaaaaahhhh. 

13 minutes ago, Kev56 said:

Lots of talk about the run in and how spurs are going to drop points, and we've got the easier run in. In my opinion that's bollox. Where are they gonna drop points? They are buzzing and playing good football. We look lost and with that complete prat we have up front who really doesn't give a f**k about Chelsea I'm really concerned. We will be in cl next year which is as much as we hoped for at the start of the season. Hopefully I've got it all totally wrong. Will never stop loving this club, but at the moment aaaaaaaaaaaahhhh. 

All we have to do is win at home against Southampton, Boro, Watford and Sunderland, and away to WBA, and the title is ours, it won't matter what they do, they could smash the record for consecutive wins, but still have no silverware. 

Offer me that scenario with 6 games to go last August and i would of bit your arm off.

Southampton isn't easy. Sunderland have beaten us a few times. Boro and Watford in theory shouldn't be too bad, but then I didn't think Palace would be. WBA away have beaten us several times in recent years, so that's not easy.

It's going to be tough.

That Sunderland defeat at home still infuriates me.

2 minutes ago, Zeta said:

Southampton isn't easy. Sunderland have beaten us a few times. Boro and Watford in theory shouldn't be too bad, but then I didn't think Palace would be. WBA away have beaten us several times in recent years, so that's not easy.

It's going to be tough.

It will be tough of course but we have definitely the more straightforward run in on paper, we have previous title-winning experience within the squad and a manager that has won titles with Juventus before. They have none of those things and also a historical penchant for bottling it when the pressure is on. Whilst I agree that Sunday was poor and disconcerting in some ways, it's the only bad game that we've played in a long time (I personally thought we were ok against Palace and unlucky not to draw).

A 4 point lead is obviously not as comfortable as a 10 point lead, but at the same there is a lot to be positive about. Most bookies are still giving us an 80%+ chance of winning the League. So long as Conte can get our first XI fit again and work on the defensive aspect of our game then I think we will be ok.

This was a painful result indeed.  Conte stuck to the 3-4-3 after Alonso was injured and I think this is how we lost.  Maybe 4-3-3 could have been better.  With the way Eden was man marked, as i correctly predicted would be the number 1 strategy United deploy - it may have been better to play him high up as a false 9 because Ander would not follow him into the box [leaving a huge hole in mid.]  Conte, no doubt is a great manager, but could have perhaps reacted like this to disrupt United's plans.  Also, some times it's better to play with Willian Pedro and Hazard then maybe Diego come on as a sub - I mean team selection should be form based and not name based.  

Having said that, I think the manager and the squad have what it takes to see it through!  i doubt Spurs will will have 100% results from now to the end of the season!  All we need to do is win all our home games and the league should be ours.  

Come on Chelsea!!!

hopefully conte sits down with the players and rewatches the match (no doubt they will) to show them how poor they were. we haven't played well for many games now. we looked jaded against bournemouth too, it's almost like we're running on empty. luiz is looking like his concentration issue is rearing it's ugly head again too. looking at our bench is quite light. zouma is very uncomfortable on the ball and hasn't long come back from his injury. cesc and willian are probably our main game changers when you look to the bench. i would like to see one or two of musonda, kenedy, ake, chalobah, loftus-cheek make more regular appearances than they have. 

I don't think i could take this going down to the last game of the season but i could honestly see it happening. 

5 minutes ago, RIP Mourinho said:

I don't think i could take this going down to the last game of the season but i could honestly see it happening. 

No chance! Tottenham haven't been playing with any pressure up until now, plus we play before them in 4 of the remaining 6 games (with the 6th and final game being played at the same time) we will be able to put the pressure on them and they won't handle it.

44 minutes ago, Zeta said:

Southampton isn't easy. Sunderland have beaten us a few times. Boro and Watford in theory shouldn't be too bad, but then I didn't think Palace would be. WBA away have beaten us several times in recent years, so that's not easy.

It's going to be tough.

You do realise we have already beaten all of those teams this season, four of them at their own grounds. 

11 minutes ago, coco said:

You do realise we have already beaten all of those teams this season, four of them at their own grounds. 

So the reverse fixtures, at a different time of the season are all going to be the same then?

I seem to recall beating Man utd 4-0 earlier in the season, but that reverse fixture wasn't easy was it?

 

24 minutes ago, Zeta said:

So the reverse fixtures, at a different time of the season are all going to be the same then?

I seem to recall beating Man utd 4-0 earlier in the season, but that reverse fixture wasn't easy was it?

 

My point was none of those teams are a top 6 team, manyoo are and doesnt compare to the fixtures remaining. Not saying it's easy peasy, just nowhere near as hard as it could of been.

Would you have taken this scenario last August ?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2017/04/18/diego-costa-victor-moses-played-man-utd-despite-suffering-illness/

Key Chelsea players were struck down with an illness before Sunday’s Premier League game against Manchester United, although some played on nonetheless and the club believe that it contributed significantly to their poor performance. 

However, it can be revealed that as well as Marcos Alonso, the striker Diego Costa and winger Victor Moses both missed training on Friday because of the sickness.

Conte does not want the players to look for excuses for the performance and it is expected that all three will be fit to play against Tottenham Hotspur on Saturday in the much-anticipated FA Cup semi-final at Wembley between the Premier League’s two top clubs.

 

 

1 hour ago, dhidza said:

This was a painful result indeed.  Conte stuck to the 3-4-3 after Alonso was injured and I think this is how we lost.  Maybe 4-3-3 could have been better.  With the way Eden was man marked, as i correctly predicted would be the number 1 strategy United deploy - it may have been better to play him high up as a false 9 because Ander would not follow him into the box [leaving a huge hole in mid.]  Conte, no doubt is a great manager, but could have perhaps reacted like this to disrupt United's plans.  Also, some times it's better to play with Willian Pedro and Hazard then maybe Diego come on as a sub - I mean team selection should be form based and not name based.  

Having said that, I think the manager and the squad have what it takes to see it through!  i doubt Spurs will will have 100% results from now to the end of the season!  All we need to do is win all our home games and the league should be ours.  

Come on Chelsea!!!

Someone mentioned this before and it was how I thought aswell.........Just can't understand why Ake did not replace Alonso. Then you are not rearranging the back 3 or team set up. I think Conte got this wrong, same thing against Palace with Moses being out. One wing back injury and we are seemingly lost. Hopefully next season there will be some cover.

3 hours ago, enigma said:

hopefully conte sits down with the players and rewatches the match (no doubt they will) to show them how poor they were. we haven't played well for many games now. we looked jaded against bournemouth too, it's almost like we're running on empty. luiz is looking like his concentration issue is rearing it's ugly head again too. looking at our bench is quite light. zouma is very uncomfortable on the ball and hasn't long come back from his injury. cesc and willian are probably our main game changers when you look to the bench. i would like to see one or two of musonda, kenedy, ake, chalobah, loftus-cheek make more regular appearances than they have. 

We have very good talent on the bench.  I like Kenedy, Chalobah and I believe that Basthuayi is way better than Origi.  I understand that you don't change a winning team - and it was good to go on a run and build confidence.  But Conte kind of screwed up not playing Chalobah, Loftus, Basthuayi during the season in matches we were so comfortable with leads of 2-0 plus.  I'm sure Basthuayi with game time would be a good option for us especially when Costa is off it like now.  Also why the feck then was Ake recalled from loan?  Alonso is out and Conte moves Moses to left wing back.  

Anyways - Conte has done so well this season, he looks a clever guy and will obviously learn and improve.  I'm happy with the season and think we will win the league, but the manager needs to give the kids a better run around next time to keep the confidence and squad always ready.  

2 hours ago, havelschayes said:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2017/04/18/diego-costa-victor-moses-played-man-utd-despite-suffering-illness/

Key Chelsea players were struck down with an illness before Sunday’s Premier League game against Manchester United, although some played on nonetheless and the club believe that it contributed significantly to their poor performance. 

However, it can be revealed that as well as Marcos Alonso, the striker Diego Costa and winger Victor Moses both missed training on Friday because of the sickness.

Conte does not want the players to look for excuses for the performance and it is expected that all three will be fit to play against Tottenham Hotspur on Saturday in the much-anticipated FA Cup semi-final at Wembley between the Premier League’s two top clubs.

 

 

Players are human and at some stage will fall sick.  That's why it's important to give other squad members [Loftus cheek, Chalobah, Basthuayi, Ake] valuable game time during the season so that when sh*t hits the fan, the subs will be ready to fill in and win.  Real Madrid do it a lot e.g. with Morata, Isco, Barca with Rafinha, Gomez, Bayern with Douglas Costa, Renato Sanchez.  It's important to give players like Basthuayi Loftus Cheek, Kennedy Chalobah done game time on dead-rubber matches.  I hope we go in this direction in the near future

3 hours ago, coco said:

Would you have taken this scenario last August ?

Of course, but I don't see how that's relevant, that was last season. That makes no difference to thinking the remaining fixtures are going to be tough.

5 hours ago, pacquiao said:

No chance! Tottenham haven't been playing with any pressure up until now, plus we play before them in 4 of the remaining 6 games (with the 6th and final game being played at the same time) we will be able to put the pressure on them and they won't handle it.

Same scenario this time last season, with Leicester playing games before them. And we all know what happened then!!!!!!!!!