Last season we destroyed teams with quick counter-attacks and were ruthless. City would have rather played Barcelona than us last season. Everyone was praising Conte being the best tactician. 

With the increased number of games he seems to struggle with managing player fitness levels. Maybe that's why he never went far with Juventus in the UCL. 2/3 games a week seems to throw him off as he doesn't get enough time to sort out his tactics and prepare. When given time and resources I think Conte will flourish but he isn't used to this intensity of game after game yet. If he stays I'm sure he will learn from this season and given the transfers and players, can prepare for this stage of the season better next time as matches come thick and fast. 

37 minutes ago, Bobbywoodhogan said:

I might get flak for this but here goes... I think he should go.

You won't get any flak, that's your opinion, better to be honest.

I want to see him smile again and jump up and down and get excited, if he can return to that person, he can stay, no matter the results. But i cannot be doing with looking at his grumpy, sad, ghostly face anymore, so cheer up or bugger off Antonio.

58 minutes ago, yorkleyblue said:

So, we have this thread full (mostly) of whinging about the manager who won the league last year, some people wanting him gone now, some in the summer and some not wanting him gone, when, at the same time, we have a thread blaming it all on our "officially incompetent board", which seems to get supported in a lot of other threads, and a lot more moaning about Marina and our deep and knowledgeable information about heh internal workings of the transfer market.

My question to you all is who is it?  Manager, Board, Marina or just sometimes sh*t happens and we have no god-given right to be winning every game all the time?

I think it's perfectly fair for people to have grievances with the way the club has been run/managed.
I agree with you in the respect that a lot of it is over-exaggerated however but I don't think the blame should be specific to one person, I think anyone can see that the board have made some dodgy decisions, as has Conte.
Like most situations, it's a mixture of people plus luck not being on our side. Let's face it, Luiz and Alonso were panic buys last year, it was just our luck that they proved to be critical in our title win.

 

With the exception of Jose’s first sacking, and probably Carlo’s - although I was torn on that one, I’ve agreed with every one of Romans swinging of his sickle.

I wouldn’t agree with Contes though. Look at what he has to work with compared to Pep and Jose. We are where our squad dictates we should be imo compared to the others.

I think he is gone either way, he’ll walk at the end of the season and he’ll probably cite broken promises as the reason. I hope he gets to do that but it wouldn’t surprise me if he is pushed after we are bent over by Barca in the CL.

Needs to go now. His smile has gone, his passion seems to have left him. With everything that's gone on, all the rumours of this, that, and the other. I think it would be a huge relief to him if they let him go. Think what Chelsea need to do as a club is look at themselves and ask themselves why we have had more managers in the last 10 years than any top club in world football. Something is wrong deep down. At times it's an absolute f**king joke at Chelsea. As I said before, he'll walk. 

I think the biggest question we have to ask ourselves is: Does Conte want to be here?
I love the man and I'm Conte In but if he wants to leave, it'll clearly have a negative effect on the players.
The passionate Antonio we saw last season seems so beaten down.

Just now, TomCFC85 said:

I think it's perfectly fair for people to have grievances with the way the club has been run/managed.
I agree with you in the respect that a lot of it is over-exaggerated however but I don't think the blame should be specific to one person, I think anyone can see that the board have made some dodgy decisions, as has Conte.
Like most situations, it's a mixture of people plus luck not being on our side. Let's face it, Luiz and Alonso were panic buys last year, it was just our luck that they proved to be critical in our title win.

 

Yeah, and Zappacosta was a panic buy this year but this time it didn't really pay off. The late transfer activity in the summer has to stop. 

I'm not sure why Marina is getting the blame either, I'm pretty sure she's just a negotiator. I don't know who to blame entirely because I don't know what goes on in the background. But I think Conte is trying to deflect a lot of the blame when he needs to take a fair share of it, I can completely understand where he's coming from though. He's a manager and he's likely not to be in this Chelsea job forever, if it looks like he's against massive odds with the board then it'll look better on him, but Conte expressed his likeness of Danny Drinkwater in the past when he first came to Chelsea. But he chose Kante instead because he knew we couldn't sign both players from Leicester just after they won the league. So I don't think this was a board signing, I think this is purely on Conte making a mistake, either way, I think it's unlikely that the board or Conte are fully to blame.   

1 hour ago, 2211 said:

I'm going to say in, although I reckon he will be either gone in the summer or even sooner if we get embarrassed by Barcelona.

I want him to change though. 

I think he has handled quite a few things badly this season, e.g Michy's lack of game-time , not even trying 2 strikers together when we are losing, Bakayoko playing almost every game despite not performing, the argument with Jose and not being more flexible with tactics.

I never want to see the false number 9 again - last night Hazard completely missed a header that any striker at any level (u16's, u18 etc..) would of connected with. 

We need Hazard to creating not waiting for others to create for him!

I wouldn't mind seeing more of Hudson-Odoi as he is more of a attacking threat than Pedro IMO

I would like him to coach us how to score more goals than the opposition, rather than conceding less than the opposition (if you get what I mean).

We played the weakest Arsenal team we have faced in years in the 1st leg of the league cup semi final and we couldn't even get a lead to take into the second leg - he is far too cautious with his tactics.

There is also only so much moaning you can do publicly before it starts affecting the players and the whole mood of the club.

The board has it faults and we all know that, but I believe we have a good enough team to make it into the top 4.

We have a big lead over Arsenal at the moment, so we need to make sure we finish above Spurs.

He needs to look in the mirror this morning and realize that the transfer window is shut for this season and get us back to playing like a team that are defending champions of the premier league.

He is the Head Coach at Chelsea, he needs to start acting like one.

Couldn't have put it any better. Not undermining him or his achievements in anyway but it seems he set himself up for the current situation as soon as he commenced his summer holiday after last season.

Started terribly and from dispensing with Costa the way he did, which I don't mind anyway as he picks his team, to coming back and not signing an extension to the statement about Mourinho season, they were all signs that things wouldn't go smoothly.

And for those that say he's not backed by the board please answer how do you fully back a man that has made it clear he is not going to stay. Some say our club has a player power culture but he was fully backed when he took a stance on Costa though Costa was our top striker and one of best in the world, he has been backed in the saga with David Luiz one of, if not our best defender last season. Not being given a 32yr+ defender costing over £50m or a massively overpriced LWB whose club seemed to raise their price for him every week in my opinion doesn't translate to the board not backing the manager.

Yes it may not be a high profile player but the board have provided players in every position he wanted. Not juat who he wanted and sometimes he did get who he wanted.

I always knew Conte as a very stubborn man, even more so than Mourinho and I said to people not to be deceived by his gentle, amiable manners last season. He is very stubborn and like he said himself not diplomatic. 

I am happy with the boards position. I didn't grow up seeing us as serial winners. When it came I was happy, I'm still happy even now. Can we do better? Of course we can but it's not the end of the world and winning every season is not our birthright or anyone's for that matter.

The age of FIFA has disillusioned quite a lot of people as to the realisms around the game.

26 minutes ago, Famous CFC said:

Needs to go now. His smile has gone, his passion seems to have left him. With everything that's gone on, all the rumours of this, that, and the other. I think it would be a huge relief to him if they let him go. Think what Chelsea need to do as a club is look at themselves and ask themselves why we have had more managers in the last 10 years than any top club in world football. Something is wrong deep down. At times it's an absolute f**king joke at Chelsea. As I said before, he'll walk. 

Are we any more of a top club than Real Madrid who have had  about 14 managers to our 10 since Roman tool over?

Managerial changes ARE part of the pressures a club that wins or has ambitions to win faces.

9 hours ago, Slojo said:

I expect to get a lot of hate for this, I backed Jose 10000% even when the results were going sour, I wanted the board to make a statement and side with Jose over the players so player power wouldn't win.

But the more I look at this Conte situation the more I can't help but feel he's looking after himself a lot more than he is looking after the club. I'm not saying every manager who takes the job must be a loyal devout, but I expect them to do everything they can to win things at this club. But judging by Conte's words and actions it looks like he's protecting his stock more than anything, he's trying to make out that the side isn't good enough to compete and he's in a difficult position. When the reality is he's had plenty of money to spend but he's spent it on bad players. 

We can't really use the Emenalo excuse anymore, January was just as bad as June, July & August. I can't feel any optimism in his words and I can't help but feel he's losing the players also, every game it's like we are overachieving and the players aren't good enough to do this and that, but he's had 4 transfer windows to fix this, and roughly 400 million to spend at MOST. I simply cannot subscribe to the idea that Conte is harshly done by the board on this one. Okay you didn't get Vidal and you got Barkley, but why are you chasing so many mediocre players in the process? Why did you spend a massive sum on Drinkwater if you aren't interested in playing him and Kante together? What's going on... 

I might regret saying this but I'm going to put it out there, I won't be too sad to see him go at this point, I think it's what's best for the club. Hopefully, things turn around in February, January is a month I'll like to forget. 

Sorry but can`t agree. Conte by himself said he has zero power on player choices. And the players we bring was board choice.

I post the 2 interview with him in his thread.

Sorry but no manager will be happy with a players that he doesn`t like or want.

He showed them that with Michy Batshuai and they still mess with his work, what exactly the board and you expect to happen ?

And no matter what manager will come, this team is not good enough. Last year was not good enough. We win it thanks to Conte. Or you forget at what place Conte took the team ???

And for the young gun, most of them are simply not good enough. You have to prove yourself at the loan, then do some impact. We do wrong with Salah, De Bruyne and Lukaku, but there is purely the Mou and board fault.

The three of them show great potential and was doing crazy good at their respective loan. There it was manager fault.

Tell me 1 young gun that was so good at loan or ingames, and Conte not give him a chance? Christensen shows quality and he play him. Same with Moses last season, who took Invanovic place. Same happen with players thats shows quality like Pedro last season and so on.

Also there is no one that will risk his job to integrate not ready for first team young player, when he knows if he don`t win something big, he will be sacked. Why would he risk his job, to lay young players and integrate them to the team, when he will not recieve the benefits from that next or season after that, simply because someone else will took incharge and he will be sacked.

Same s*** happen with Louis Van Gaal ....

Yeah we spend the money bad, but it`s exactly Marina problem. She prefer to spend 100m. on 3 average players, then spend 120m. on 2 world class players.

Conte wanted Alexis Sanchez get Giroud. Wanted Kyle Walker/Danilo/Mendy and the list goes  on, get mostly average players.

And there is so much problems and scandal, how exactly you want us to do well ? No Way.

I will always back him up. He do the impossible last season and the board ruined all. For once we could have stability and the best manager in the world and board failed hard. They deserve to go.

But the reality is Conte will walk summer will go to other team and will win big. Mark my words. We will get some joke like Enrique, cause no other top manager will want to come here and will not see better then 3rd spot.

It`s completely our fault.

?he club's policy should entirely be changed or we won`t see better days.

I was the first in the summer to say if we continue like this, we will finish bad and Conte will walk and i was entirely right.

 

Edited February 1, 20188 yr by brakeit

36 minutes ago, Slojo said:

I can't remember Jose being vocally unhappy about the signings made at the club, besides the Shevchenko which was clearly known to be an Abramovich signing. 

Conte is the only one who's made a stand against it, especially in that manner. I'm happy he's made it but he doesn't do himself any favours when he's signing average players for ridiculous fees and chasing Andy Carroll in the market. 

edit: I do recall him saying a few things here and there that he hopes to bring in new players, but he's said the same at United and everywhere he's gone, it's not in the same manner as Conte. Conte has been very vocal about the lack of transfer activity and not getting his targets. 

I do remember Mourinho saying things in January in the 06/07 season when Chelsea had a lot of bad injuries, Cech, Terry and Carvalho. He wanted defensive reinforcements as playing Ferreira and Essien against Liverpool wasn’t going to be enough, the board refused and got him Ben Haim in the summer. Personally think it all started when Sheva was signed, made a manager change his own formation and believes for a player put on you.

1 minute ago, brakeit said:

Sorry but can`t agree. Conte by himself said he has zero power on player choices. And the players we bring was board choice.

I post the 2 interview with him in his thread.

Sorry but no manager will be happy with a players that he doesn`t like or want.

He showed them that with Michy Batshuai and they still mess with his work, what exactly the board and you expect to happen ?

And no matter what manager will come, this team is not good enough. Last year was not good enough. We win it thanks to Conte. Or you forget at what place Conte took the team ???

And for the young gun, most of them are simply not good enough. You have to prove yourself at the loan, then do some impact. We do wrong with Salah, De Bruyne and Lukaku, but there is purely the Mou and board fault.

The three of them show great potential and was doing crazy good at their respective loan. There it was manager fault.

Tell me 1 young gun that was so good at loan or ingames, and Conte not give him a chance? Christensen shows quality and he play him. Same with Moses last season, who took Invanovic place. Same happen with players thats shows quality like Pedro last season and so on.

Also there is no one that will risk his job to integrate not ready for first team young player, when he knows if he don`t win something big, he will be sacked. Why would he risk his job, to lay young players and integrate them to the team, when he will not recieve the benefits from that next or season after that, simply because someone else will took incharge and he will be sacked.

Same s*** happen with Louis Van Gaal ....

Yeah we spend the money bad, but it`s exactly Marina problem. She prefer to spend 100m. on 3 average players, then spend 120m. on 2 world class players.

Conte wanted Alexis Sanchez get Giroud. Wanted Kyle Walker/Danilo/Mendy and the list goes  on, get mostly average players.

And there is so much problems and scandal, how exactly you want us to do well ? No Way.

I will always back him up. He do the impossible last season and the board ruined all. For once we could have stability and the best manager in the world and board failed hard. They deserve to go.

But the reality is Conte will walk summer will go to other team and will win big. Mark my words. We will get some joke like Enrique, cause no other top manager will want to come here and will not see better then 3rd spot.

It`s completely our fault.

?he club's policy should entirely be changed or we won`t see better days.

 

 

Conte doesn’t have zero power on transfers, end off.

I remember Jose talking about omelettes and eggs, unfortunately this is a cycle that has been happening for years.

Just now, Ernie_blue said:

I do remember Mourinho saying things in January in the 06/07 season when Chelsea had a lot of bad injuries, Cech, Terry and Carvalho. He wanted defensive reinforcements as playing Ferreira and Essien against Liverpool wasn’t going to be enough, the board refused and got him Ben Haim in the summer. Personally think it all started when Sheva was signed, made a manager change his own formation and believes for a player put on you.

I was about 10 years old then so it's always hard to remember stuff like that, I do remember Jose's row with Shevchenko and that not being his signing. 

But I think Conte has been very vocal about it this season, more so than any other manager I can remember, I would say Jose is a far away second. 

Not even AVB moaned about transfers when he first came to Chelsea despite chasing Modric all summer only to end up with Raul Meireles last minute. But that was also a problem, I'm glad Conte is making noise about it, but I'm not happy with his recent comments. He's going way over the top, if you've spent 200 million on transfers you can't keep moaning about lack of transfer activity & targets. Especially when it's completely undermining the players, I think it's getting ridiculous. 

Yeah sure:

 

http://www.skysports.com/watch/video/sports/football/teams/chelsea/11221878/conte-the-club-handle-transfers

Chelsea boss Antonio Conte has hinted he has little to do with the club's transfer dealings, with the board deciding which players are bought or sold rather than him.

In the sky sports there is video where he clearly said it, IT`S THE CLUB !!!

How hard is to see he is unhappy and he is unhappy from the summer. He didn`t get the player he wanted in his first season, he didn`t get it in the summer, he didn`t get it in winter.

He said it many times. He was hinted so much, by saying i don`t think we are trying, or i wanted that and that player, but i can get the market and blq, blq, blq.

Slojo, we can spend even 500m., but is it matter if it`s not the players that the manager want?

How many times he need to say he is just a coach ???

It`s obviously there is a huge row between him and the board and that is because we have bad result. It`s always reflect on the team.

Same happen with Jose.

Don`t forget on what place Conte took the team. There isn`t a single manager in the world that can do better then him. So i won`t be surprised when he leave in the summer, we appoint Enrique and he will be gone in the half season, and we will be probably 6 or 7 by that time.

Again just i foresee what will happen in the summer i can see such scenario happen. Just mark my words.

We will speak of this soon.

 

Edited February 1, 20188 yr by brakeit

3 minutes ago, Slojo said:

I was about 10 years old then so it's always hard to remember stuff like that, I do remember Jose's row with Shevchenko and that not being his signing. 

But I think Conte has been very vocal about it this season, more so than any other manager I can remember, I would say Jose is a far away second. 

Not even AVB moaned about transfers when he first came to Chelsea despite chasing Modric all summer only to end up with Raul Meireles last minute. But that was also a problem, I'm glad Conte is making noise about it, but I'm not happy with his recent comments. He's going way over the top, if you've spent 200 million on transfers you can't keep moaning about lack of transfer activity & targets. Especially when it's completely undermining the players, I think it's getting ridiculous. 

I don’t remember Mourinho moaning like Conte back then but he did mention it a few times, it was a glaringly obvious Chelsea needed another defender and it cost us his 3rd title on the trot IMO even with a sh*t Sheva.

The only reason I see why Conte has been saying what he has is to push away any blame. If I worked on the board I would be pissed off with some of the things he has said but also does anyone want Chelsea backing a manager with expensive players who never signed an extension? I do think the board have f**ked up but Conte takes his fair share of blame.

10 minutes ago, brakeit said:

Yeah sure:

 

http://www.skysports.com/watch/video/sports/football/teams/chelsea/11221878/conte-the-club-handle-transfers

Chelsea boss Antonio Conte has hinted he has little to do with the club's transfer dealings, with the board deciding which players are bought or sold rather than him.

In the sky sports there is video where he clearly said it, IT`S THE CLUB !!!

How hard is to see he is unhappy and he is unhappy from the summer. He didn`t get the player he wanted in his first season, he didn`t get it in the summer, he didn`t get it in winter.

He said it many times. He was hinted so much, by saying i don`t think we are trying, or i wanted that and that player, but i can get the market and blq, blq, blq.

 

So if the club said Conte does have a say would you believe them? I reckon that would conveniently be a no.

6 minutes ago, Ernie_blue said:

So if the club said Conte does have a say would you believe them? I reckon that would conveniently be a no.

But the club always remain conveniently quiet. You never hear from RA, Buck, any of the f**kers.

Let's face it, we are going to lose the best coach we could possibly hope to have at present, very few better (possibly only Pep?) and get in A N Other who again, will be gone within the blink of an eye because we won't be able to compete and get top 4 - especially if we lose Hazard in the summer.

1 hour ago, Nibs said:

A definite IN from me. Really want him to stay but don't expect it to happen - he looks rather deflated of late and no wonder why with our f**king inept Board.

And so it goes. New guy comes in, whoever that is and we see an improvement for a while but within less than a season we will be back here again. Let's face it, there isn't a Coach / Manager alive, ever existed that can satisfy our board and give them what they want. Success, after success after success but on a shoestring budget. They want to drive a Ferrari but pay the price of a Hyundai.

Seems like they're willing to spend the money, they'd just rather have 10 Hyundai's instead of 3 Ferrari's. 

3 minutes ago, Nibs said:

But the club always remain conveniently quiet. You never hear from RA, Buck, any of the f**kers.

Let's face it, we are going to lose the best coach we could possibly hope to have at present, very few better (possibly only Pep?) and get in A N Other who again, will be gone within the blink of an eye because we won't be able to compete and get top 4 - especially if we lose Hazard in the summer.

You really think Chelsea will randomly release a press statement on how transfers work at Chelsea Football Club? If they really felt they need to reply to Conte then that really says how bad the situation has got. Most people thought Conte was leaving before we was playing this bad, the last month has just got worse and worse, Conte to me actually looks like he doesn’t know what to do or does he really give a dam.

Conte obviously wants to be a manager (GM in the NFL) but is clearly seen as a head coach by the board forcing this "new-era US approach to running the club". Conte has no future in Chelsea, like it or not. The games, the results, it really has nothing to do with it. It is just the fact that his style of doing business is the opposite of what Chelsea wants and aims at, and now we see the clash on pretty much every press conference. 

Currently, we invest heavily in the academy, developing talent, send 30+ players on loan spells, and with Conte's philosophy it will take a plane crash for them to get a chance to play some serious ball for Chelsea. Christensen just confirms the rule. So does freaking Ross Barkley at the other end - sending message to every other young midfielder, waiting on his chance, to piss off. 

Yesterday we played Bournemouth without a striker!!! Morata is injured, and we trade Batsman (who busted his ass in these past few games) for a fu** injured 31 y.o. knowing we won't have a striker for this game. 

It feels like there is a bit of bad blood from both the board and Conte at this point, for him to continue with us.   

 

 

Edited February 1, 20188 yr by _goggs_

7 minutes ago, RIP Mourinho said:

Seems like they're willing to spend the money, they'd just rather have 10 Hyundai's instead of 3 Ferrari's. 

The problem is the Ferrari's are already at top clubs on top wages. We're in a similar boat to Liverpool in so far we need to buy the next up and coming Ferrari, as far I can see that's perhaps where we're failing at the mo.

44 minutes ago, abister1 said:

Are we any more of a top club than Real Madrid who have had  about 14 managers to our 10 since Roman tool over?

Managerial changes ARE part of the pressures a club that wins or has ambitions to win faces.

Real are a little different to us. There extremely strict on what a manager most win each year. Have a few Real coaches been dropped after winning a league title? Chelsea amongst the top teams in England are a joke for the way managers have come and gone. If there not good enough, fair play. But some sackings have been a a little harsh to say the least. Maybe Roman needs to lower his expectations. There can only ever be one champion a season. And now the EPL, as it has been for a good few years, is very tough to win. And, it's only getting tougher. The Arsenal board have been absolute stars the way they've treat Arsene. Imagine how long he'd have lasted at Chelsea. 

Edited February 1, 20188 yr by Famous CFC

25 minutes ago, Ernie_blue said:

So if the club said Conte does have a say would you believe them? I reckon that would conveniently be a no.

Don`t get it person, but are you blind?

Why should i believe to them, when this thing happen with 3rd manager ?? Carlo, Mou and now Conte. Isn`t it obvious who the fault is ?

It`s pretty obvious from the summer. Conte make it clear they are not buying the players he want. Marina was always slow and lost a lot of Conte target. Ask her the reason. Conte said he want more power, more control, he get zero. It`s like she doesn`t want him to have power, cause probably her power will be limited. How many times Conte said we need more players in the summer, we need it fast ?? How many times he said i wanted that and that player, but the market is hard and blq, blq, blq.... It`s was so obvious he is not happy and they are not bringing his player. He even said he is just a coach.

Or you want Guardiola to come here, same scenario and then you will blame him as well, and say his method are outdated and he don`t know anymore what players to put in the starting 11. Suddenly he lost his touch.

This is what most of you are trying to say.

For 1 season Conte forget how to pick the best starting 11. No matter that he changed the system, players and so on, but some folks are always negative and after the match and result it`s easy to say, this one should be playing, and this one should not be started and same old s***.

Conte is telling the things how it is. That is.  And i like it that way. Not said all it`s okay, it`s all my fault, next one come and repeat the same s****.

 the special one, no no no, it`s the board fault. In the summer we was in perfect position for top players and there was plenty available. We just didn`t get them, thanks to Marina.

 

 

Edited February 1, 20188 yr by brakeit

1 minute ago, the special one said:

The problem is the Ferrari's are already at top clubs on top wages. We're in a similar boat to Liverpool in so far we need to buy the next up and coming Ferrari, as far I can see that's perhaps where we're failing at the mo.

If only we could make Cobham a Ferrari car plant.