6 minutes ago, Chelsc96 said:

The team is crap. We were always going to struggle for top four, especially with Manutd coming into form (their summer transfer window was fantastic) and Tottenham just having a much better attack (Kane is worth more than our entire forward line put together, including attacking midfielders). 

We have been fortunate that Liverpool have been poor to put us even in contention. The warning signs have been there since December 2021 that we needed to do severe surgery on the squad, but that did not happen. Our transfer window was, arguably, the worst in the league. We did not fix any of the weaknesses that we had. 

The squad management has been awful for the last 2 or 3 seasons. 

This team won the champions league in convincing fashion. And got to 2 finals last season marginally losing on penalties despite being the better team in both games. 

It's the management more than the players. 

I don't know what it is he is trying to achieve. I don't understand the tactics. Don't understand the player selections. Players look like they are low on morale and clueless on what to do. No one apart from the usual (Silva, Azpilicueta etc) are fighting. This has the potential to escalate very quickly. It's almost like he already lost the dressing room or rather never managed to win it over.

 

I am not sure what the plan was today at all. We were so open in midfield they just played through us easy we hardly won any of the midfield battles.

2 minutes ago, DannyVblue said:

This team won the champions league in convincing fashion. And got to 2 finals last season marginally losing on penalties despite being the better team in both games. 

It's the management more than the players. 

Even under Potter, Tuchel, and Lampard we failed to beat Arsenal. 

Concerned for him and the club atm. He has injuries but his team selections don’t make sense from the outside looking in and there’s no clear identity coming through. Also feel like there’s a disconnect between him and the supporters/players. 

Just now, reparto corse said:

I don't know what it is he is trying to achieve. I don't understand the tactics. Don't understand the player selections. Players look like they are low on morale and clueless on what to do. No one apart from the usual (Silva, Azpilicueta etc) are fighting. This has the potential to escalate very quickly. It's almost like he already lost the dressing room or rather never managed to win it over.

 

This is what I am seeing from the players they don’t look convinced at his methods at all.

13 minutes ago, Chelsc96 said:

The squad management has been awful for the last 2 or 3 seasons. 

Yeah man,  the squad only won the CL 2 seasons ago. Pipe down, Potter is a fraud.

7 minutes ago, DannyVblue said:

This team won the champions league in convincing fashion. And got to 2 finals last season marginally losing on penalties despite being the better team in both games. 

It's the management more than the players. 

Yep. This is a flawed squad in terms of challenging City but it absolutely should be in top four at the minimum.

9 minutes ago, DannyVblue said:

This team won the champions league in convincing fashion. And got to 2 finals last season marginally losing on penalties despite being the better team in both games. 

It's the management more than the players. 

You are looking at history. Cup competitions involve luck; leagues involve form. Our form at the beginning of last season carried us to top four through our poor form that was existent for most of the season. We had a 10 point and 11 point lead over Tottenham and Arsenal, respectively, which reduced to 3 and 5 by the end. And it wasn't even like those two sides were amazing; they were average and still closed the gap. We were just pretty poor and have been for a while.

There is also one major change to the squad since that time. Kante is finished. Kante was top quality at that time, but we have never replaced him, so it is not the same. We no longer have Werner, who I think was our best attacker, Low bar, but he contributed far more than a lot of other players in the front line. Then we have to look at the aging of players who were already quite old at the time.

You say that its management more than the players, so why has our form been so poor under Tuchel for so long? There is an illusion that our form was better based on our competitors being poor. 

Edited November 6, 20223 yr by Chelsc96

8 minutes ago, DannyVblue said:

This team won the champions league in convincing fashion. And got to 2 finals last season marginally losing on penalties despite being the better team in both games. 

It's the management more than the players. 

So we weren't complaining about Havertz, Pulisic, Ziyech etc before Potter came along.

Let's face it, we just don't have a very good squad at the moment.

All those saying Tuchel was the problem, well the ugly truth is that this is the Chelsea squad we have without a top coach managing them and it was delusional to think things would be better without him.

Go back to Tuchel and grovel. 

I have never seen a Chelsea team looked so f*cked than I've seen today.

Even under the worse versions of Sarri, Tuchel, Lamps, Avram etc. we have never looked this f*cked

It's both. 

We have an unbalanced squad and a very reactive manager who continues to reward underperformers. 

We should be finishing Top 4 with our investment and squad, but I look at the clubs around us and their football has meaning and purpose. I see nothing as such for us and a big reason for that is Potter overcomplicates our football and system. 

 

Havertz, Mount, and Sterling should not be in the starting XI. Let's begin with that. 

3 minutes ago, Chelsc96 said:

You are looking at history. Cup competitions involve luck;

Sometimes, but there was absolutely zero luck involved in the 2021 win.

4 minutes ago, Chelsc96 said:

We had a 10 point and 11 point lead over Tottenham and Arsenal, respectively, which reduced to 3 and 5 by the end.

 

Yeah because both had just the league to focus on while we were juggling 5 tournaments and an unprecented ownership crisis.

22 minutes ago, PloKoon13 said:

We’re not competing for seventh

That's actually the best finish I think we can achieve under him. 

Good thing about football at this level, bar any surprises or unbelievable swings of form you can relatively tell where a club will finish relative to the strength of its manager against other managers. 

We are 7th and there are definitely two manager that are clearly better than him behind us in Klopp and Moyes, there are another two better than him in Rodgers and Emery, then two or three others that are arguably similar as well in Saints boss, Palace boss and Fulham boss so the future from an analytical stand point doesn't portend well for us. 

 

Imagine finally giving Zakaria a chance to play, he scores the winning goal on his debut and then you put RLC in the starting lineup the very next match cause in your mind you're rotating smartly... 

Also the frontline of Mount, Aubameyang and Sterling isn't magically going to work just cause you insist on playing all of them at the same time and then right after we concede you want Broja and Gallagher to also magically save the match for you. 

I actually liked the 4-3-1-2 vs Zagreb, this today didn't even look like a real formation.

Ultimately poor defending from a weak corner kick lost us the match but the fact remains that we never looked like scoring at all.

Edited November 6, 20223 yr by Gol15

People blaming Potter are as delusional as the people that were blaming Tuchel at the start of the season. This team is mismatch of multiple players from various managers and eras. There are players here all from the Sarri, Lampard and Tuchel era. Firing Potter isn't going to fix anything just like firing Tuchel didn't fix anything, this team needs a complete overhaul.

Just now, Frankie8Lampard said:

People blaming Potter are as delusional as the people that were blaming Tuchel at the start of the season. This team is mismatch of multiple players from various managers and eras. There are players here all from the Sarri, Lampard and Tuchel era. Firing Potter isn't going to fix anything just like firing Tuchel didn't fix anything, this team needs a complete overhaul.

The players are one thing but the tactics and strategy can't escape criticism. 

12 minutes ago, Scott Harris said:

All those saying Tuchel was the problem, well the ugly truth is that this is the Chelsea squad we have without a top coach managing them and it was delusional to think things would be better without him.

Go back to Tuchel and grovel. 

Tuchel doesn't get the vision as Potter does, so no chance. 

He prefers specialisation and a clear separation of roles and responsibilities and ain't no way Boehly got time for that. 

2 minutes ago, Deino said:

The players are one thing but the tactics and strategy can't escape criticism. 

Not saying he should escape criticism. I personally didn't like the fact that he didn't Zakaria and Gallagher but people thinking that firing Potter is going to save our season are on something else. 

When Potter came, I was at least hoping to see some attacking football. Now I just hope to see any football.

Oh dear.  Oh dear oh dear.  Mr Potter - what are you doing?  This constant tinkering of personnel and system is really creating problems.  That aside, we arrive at every game lacking fitness, organization, desire, passion and quality vs the opposition.  It doesn't matter if the opposition is City or Forrest - the same patterns repeat.  Picking lethargic ineffective players like RLC, Auba, Havertz consistently and then changing - why not start Gallagher and Broja more often.  Start building.

What is concerning is the need in multiple games to change tactics pretty significantly - are the players not delivering or the setup that bad, or both?

One this is for sure - I am unwilling to accept an XG of <0.25 per PL game.  Fix this, or it will be clear for all to see this job came too early.

Walking a fine line as we all know player egos eventually come out, particularly when results are not going our way.  Big job on Potter's hands, and am not entirely sure he knows how to fix this.  Worse Chelsea team since early/mid 90s for me.

I think we just have to consign ourselves to a write off season and hope we can get top 4 with everyone else around us being just as erratic as us. I'd definitely stick with potter long term but he deserves all of the questions coming his way.

Just now, timetowaste said:

I think we just have to consign ourselves to a write off season and hope we can get top 4 with everyone else around us being just as erratic as us. I'd definitely stick with potter long term but he deserves all of the questions coming his way.

Would help if some reporters actually had the balls to question some decisions. 

3 minutes ago, Frankie8Lampard said:

Not saying he should escape criticism. I personally didn't like the fact that he didn't Zakaria and Gallagher but people thinking that firing Potter is going to save our season are on something else. 

I understand giving Potter chances but I personally expected him to be at least be tactically sound and bring the squad to some level of preparedness.

If this was within a week of Potter joining us, I was ok. It's been over a month now and we don't even look like a coherent squad. 2 points out of 12 in the league is woeful and there is a strong case where it may even stretch to 2 points out of 18