5 minutes ago, Mod Stark said:

I don't dispute an early Chelsea Torres was exactly that @Argo but I feel its a bit harsh to judge his time with us as just that.

I think he generally turned into a decent playmaker and put in a good shift for us. Was he a 50million Striker that scored for fun in a Blue shirt like Drogs or Diego, No, but right now (seeing as we continue to make the comparison) I'd be putting Torres in our team above Timo. Blimey, I might even push to Morata.

I don't agree he put in a shift, first sign of something going wrong (sometimes not even that) and he sulked, I started keeping a close eye on him when i went to games and was stunned by the lack of care he displayed. Then there was his interviews which were basically in many round about ways taking no responsibility and blaming anyone but himself. Apparently he was giving us/Robbie ultimatiums over playing time after the 11/12 season, with the year and a half he just had he should have been on his knees begging not to go the same way as Malouda. 

Sturridge and a semi retired Eto'o were infinity times better.

I'll give you Eto'o!

I'm just saying its easy to sum up a player cause you only look back on the early/worse times in a Chelsea shirt (Remember Drogs couldn't hit a Cows arse with a Banjo at the start, what happened there)

As far as quality goes, I've seen more of it in Torres in a blue shirt than Timo has shown in the limited time hes had.

I'll also take your Sturridge and raise you Anelka!

It's becoming an art how he's managed to miss some of the clear cut chances. Give him credit for scoring that goal and keep working hard, in addition to some good link up work. However, do have doubts going to the CL semis, FA cup final etc with Timo as the first choice striker.

Its for sure a kick in the nuts for Giroud and more so, Tammy!

40 minutes ago, icecoolguy22 said:

It's becoming an art how he's managed to miss some of the clear cut chances. Give him credit for scoring that goal and keep working hard, in addition to some good link up work. However, do have doubts going to the CL semis, FA cup final etc with Timo as the first choice striker.

Yes serious doubts. However I still find it to be more palatable than Havertz as a false 9.

I heard timo conversion in leipzig was bad, but I have no idea it is this bad. 

I thought he played very well against west ham, look very dangerous in final 3rd (his job) but final 3rd player who has problem finishing easy chances is a massive nightmare. 

 

1 hour ago, Mod Stark said:

I'll give you Eto'o!

I'm just saying its easy to sum up a player cause you only look back on the early/worse times in a Chelsea shirt (Remember Drogs couldn't hit a Cows arse with a Banjo at the start, what happened there)

As far as quality goes, I've seen more of it in Torres in a blue shirt than Timo has shown in the limited time hes had.

I'll also take your Sturridge and raise you Anelka!

Drogba being poor in his first couple of season's was a myth for me, allright he wasn't getting the numbers Henry and RVN were but you don't lead the line for two runaway title winning teams if you're playing crap, the law of averages would cost us too many results to win the league let alone walk it if he really was that bad.

Weird as this sounds Timo missing all those chances alone puts him ahead of Torres purely on the basis he's getting them, Nando would at times go weeks without a sniff of a goal because his off the ball movement was utter poverty. 

I don't believe Torres improved in time either (the Europa run possibly aside), we can point to his goal record in the Rafa season but for the first six months he played almost every minute unconditionally, we had a record number of games (he also featured in 64 of the 69) and had two of the most creative AM's in world football (which led to defenders focusing on marking them more which in theory should have given Torres more room to operate) plus a pre stagnant Oscar behind him, I'm firmly of the opinion we could have put Jermaine Beckford there in his place and he'd have been pushing a 20 tally with all those factors in his favour.

And that's before I mention his presence prevented us putting our name in the hat for Aguero, Falcao and possibly even Van Persie.

I'm very stubborn with the Torres debate the guy was an utter nightmare for me, if I was a member here at that time I would have been incandescent. He's the first (and hopefully last) case of me growing to dislike a player while he wore our shirt, I've been indifferent to many but I genuinely couldn't stand this guy. 

3 hours ago, axman2526 said:

My goodness I do not remember a match winner being so awful in a long time.

He should have had 4 or 5 not 1. These were not hard chances and he did not even hit the target with most. 

Scores the winner and everybody f**king still whining. Give me a break. 4 or 5? He had 3 clear cut chances and scored one of them. Nobody else even came close to scoring other than Mount’s 2 long range efforts.

13 minutes ago, mwblue10 said:

Scores the winner and everybody f**king still whining. Give me a break. 4 or 5? He had 3 clear cut chances and scored one of them. Nobody else even came close to scoring other than Mount’s 2 long range efforts.

First half free shot in the box unchallenged screws it over, same half same sort of chance screwed wide and over. Third chance that half is the goal.

Second half open goal on rebound from Mounts strike, puts it wide. Next chance cuts in from the right to his left foot, firm strike too close to the keeper for a corner. Third and last chance has a run on the West ham defence, slows down and tries to cut back inside, loses ball without a shot. 6 very good chances.

As for no one else coming close, first half Mount has a shot inside the box when free that was too weak and curling at the keeper. Pulisic hits a firm strike again unmarked and again far too close to the keeper. Very presentable chances.

Second half Kante breaks forward and instead of playing Ziyech clean in he over runs the ball. Finally Mount overcooks a cross too high for Tammy when the better ball was to a free Ziyech. Bad choices costing us good chances.

We could and should have scored 6 or 7 today. Our finishing let down an otherwise superb display.

Edited April 25, 20215 yr by axman2526

1 hour ago, mwblue10 said:

Scores the winner and everybody f**king still whining. Give me a break. 4 or 5? He had 3 clear cut chances and scored one of them. Nobody else even came close to scoring other than Mount’s 2 long range efforts.

I see your point mwblue but I must say that second half rebound was literally a "my Nan would have scored that and she's been dead for 10 years" type of miss.

I think his best moment was certainly the way he held off the defender and kept the ball moving for the goal.  That was great work but for 50m+ and lord knows the wages that is the standard.

I'd give him a pass mark but not much more for the day.

7 hours ago, Mod Stark said:

I'll give you Eto'o!

I'm just saying its easy to sum up a player cause you only look back on the early/worse times in a Chelsea shirt (Remember Drogs couldn't hit a Cows arse with a Banjo at the start, what happened there)

As far as quality goes, I've seen more of it in Torres in a blue shirt than Timo has shown in the limited time hes had.

I'll also take your Sturridge and raise you Anelka!

Mod, in all comps Drogba scored 16 in 40 appearances and had 8 assists in his first season, including the first of his many goals in a cup-final. People also forget he had over 2 months out with a severe stomach muscle injury.

6 hours ago, mwblue10 said:

Scores the winner and everybody f**king still whining. Give me a break. 4 or 5? He had 3 clear cut chances and scored one of them. Nobody else even came close to scoring other than Mount’s 2 long range efforts.

I should hope he scored the winner with 5 or 6 decent chances. The standards for Werner by our fans are through the floor. His finishing is absolutely abysmal for a £50m player.

Constructed the winning goal and finished it off, in a massively important game, and all people do is point out his misses.

 Give him a break ffs.

Think we need to reserve our judgment till next season. I’m guessing he will never be the world’s most clinical finisher, but he seems to have good instincts and if he could improve his conversion ratio, not a huge ask off such a low base, it could make quite a difference. I looked at some stats (will spare you those unless asked) and I’m going to make a guess that he’ll score 15+ in the premier league next season. Mock away in a year’s time if wrong..

 

4 hours ago, just said:

Mod, in all comps Drogba scored 16 in 40 appearances and had 8 assists in his first season, including the first of his many goals in a cup-final. People also forget he had over 2 months out with a severe stomach muscle injury.

Preaching to the choir here Just, love Drogs, probably my favourite ever player and not going out my way to put his early days down. I’m just using how his first couple of seasons wasn’t a reflection of how he was in general for us. I recall his first season was more spent rolling on the ground and complaining about his ripped shorts.

21 minutes ago, Mod Stark said:

Preaching to the choir here Just, love Drogs, probably my favourite ever player and not going out my way to put his early days down. I’m just using how his first couple of seasons wasn’t a reflection of how he was in general for us. I recall his first season was more spent rolling on the ground and complaining about his ripped shorts.

He got zero protection from match officials at the beginning. Whether because of his size or the fact he used to moan a lot about the treatment he was getting they often ignored blatant fouls on him.

His hold up play, physical strength, work rate and the amount of closing down he did meant he was a nightmare for defenders. I read somewhere once that we scored a record number of goals from midfield and defenders that season and I think probably much of that was down to Drogba and his ability to hold the ball up and bring others into play.

First player to hit  20 goal involvements for us and its his first season. Considering he doesn't get many chances per game that suit his specific style of play I would say he's been a relatively productive signing. Lets not forget he's hit the woodwork more than anybody else in the league so he has been unlucky in some respect.

I'm sure he will be our Salah you can see it, one thing he is doing more now is trying to come inside instead of always trying to go down the wing on his weaker foot to pit the ball across. If he can practice this more often he will get a lot more shots on goal. He's also won us 7 penalties and only taken 2 of them I believe were he to be on pen duty perhaps he would have more goals.

I hope he scores a break away goal in the semis against Madrid that helps send us through because then the similarities will just be too similar to 2012. Something tells me it will be us vs PSG in the finals it just feels like its meant to be. Tuchel vs his former team. 

Edited April 25, 20215 yr by LongtimerLurker

14 hours ago, mwblue10 said:

Scores the winner and everybody f**king still whining. Give me a break. 4 or 5? He had 3 clear cut chances and scored one of them. Nobody else even came close to scoring other than Mount’s 2 long range efforts.

Do you realize his role in this team is to get goal.

17 minutes ago, Bob stark said:

Do you realize his role in this team is to get goal.

He got a goal. The winning goal. The best sort of goal. 

35 minutes ago, Munkworth said:

He got a goal. The winning goal. The best sort of goal. 

They would be happier with Timo scoring, if they hadn't been moaning about him the whole game.

This team would be almost unstoppable with world class finisher on it.  We have lots of people that can get him the ball.  Glad Timo got the goal but he still most of the game showed a huge problem finishing chances. . . some of those chances should have quite frankly been easy chances.

Timo is a good player and I really like what he adds everywhere else but he becomes this huge liability inside the box.  

 

 

2 minutes ago, Valpo said:

This team would be almost unstoppable with world class finisher on it.  We have lots of people that can get him the ball.  Glad Timo got the goal but he still most of the game showed a huge problem finishing chances. . . some of those chances should have quite frankly been easy chances.

Timo is a good player and I really like what he adds everywhere else but he becomes this huge liability inside the box.  

 

 

I agree. As a winger, he's fine. He does all the work an offensive inside winger should be doing but as a striker.. well.. 

Timo is a player you both love and hate.

Always work so hard to create his own chances, then when he got those chances; he screwed up badly.

He's the guy that got lots of opportunities on goals, but sadly he'll score 1 out of 10 chances.

 

On 25/04/2021 at 01:12, Mod Stark said:

I'll give you Eto'o!

I'm just saying its easy to sum up a player cause you only look back on the early/worse times in a Chelsea shirt (Remember Drogs couldn't hit a Cows arse with a Banjo at the start, what happened there)

As far as quality goes, I've seen more of it in Torres in a blue shirt than Timo has shown in the limited time hes had.

I'll also take your Sturridge and raise you Anelka!

I'll never forget Drogbas interview at the end of the 05/06 season and he said his first two years he was sacrificing himself for the team. I thought to myself, stop making excuses. My knowledge of the wider game wasn't there with regards to his hold up play and defensive work. The next season he banged over 20. 

9 hours ago, Deino said:

I agree. As a winger, he's fine. He does all the work an offensive inside winger should be doing but as a striker.. well.. 

He is far worse as winger