2 minutes ago, forbzy said:

I agree. Even though Spurs won that game comfortably in the end, they looked awful until they scored, and Conte does not look happy. I think Newcastle and Manchester United are far more likely to round off the top 4.

My guess is

1. City

2. Arsenal

3. Manchester United

4. Newcastle

5. Tottenham

6. Liverpool

7. Brighton

8. Chelsea

 

1 minute ago, Drogba1 said:

My guess is

1. City

2. Arsenal

3. Manchester United

4. Newcastle

5. Tottenham

6. Liverpool

7. Brighton

8. Chelsea

 

Would you prefer 5th or 8th? 

Personally I'd prefer 8th! Hate watching Europa league. 

How many more games we need to lose before Todd pull the trigger?

potter out

34 minutes ago, bisright1 said:

Would you prefer 5th or 8th? 

Personally I'd prefer 8th! Hate watching Europa league. 

Can’t stand Europa. Completely pointless. 

Chelsea’s current injury list:

🚑 Edouard Mendy
🚑 Reece James
🚑 Wesley Fofana
🚑 Ben Chilwell
🚑 N’Golo Kante
🚑 Mason Mount
🚑 Ruben Loftus-Cheek
🚑 Armando Broja
🚑 Raheem Sterling
🚑 Christian Pulisic

This is horrendous and does provide some mitigation. Any manager would struggle with this many injuries to first team players. 

Not sure how DD fofana could be worse than Auba. Not very smart to keep playing a player who clearly is not interested in playing for us.

I disagree with most on the Europa. I think it's a good route into the ucl for the next season if you're not good enough to be in the ucl that season. The Europa League is more competitive now than some give it credit.

Especially for a coach like Potter its a good opportunity to win silverware (assuming we stick with him long enough for him to qualify 😉) it also saves having to qualify through league position. 

P.s I love a 5 English team ucl season really shows of our leagues strength 

 

Edited January 5, 20233 yr by LongtimerLurker

Bloody Tuchel, why couldn’t he play the game and please his new bosses. We could have been rebuilding with him at the realm. 

What I want to see Potter do these next few games is give starts to Hall and Carney. They showed they are ready and deserve the chance.

Further to my point above, while we know how big a blow it has been losing Kante, and another body although not an amazing player in RLC, even having missed out on Enzo Potter has lots of options to use in midfield and find the best fit and move away from using Jorginho, who we do need to move past:

 

Kovacic

Zakaria

Hall

Carney

Casadei

Mount

Gallagher

 

And soon Santos as well. 

 

Are these options good enough in a midfield to challange for the title or CL? No they are not right now but who knows what the experience could do to help the development of some of these players.

We have seen many times Hall has something about him, and Carney just took on one of the best sides in the world and did not look out of place.

Top 4 is gone, but the season need not be a waste. Think of what a further developed Hall and Carney could do for us, and remember that Reece James was not so highly rated by many in his first season, and what those experiences did to help develop him.

 

 

Sick of hearing all the Potter Out crap. Hardly his fault he inherited a team short on quality and even shorter on strike power. Our last 3 or 4 transfer windows have been awful, the only good signing was Silva but he was just a short term fix for a long term issue. We lost Rudi and got Koulibaly as a replacement, feels like the kind of deal you get when your insurance company asses your fire damage. "Like for like"? My arse. Don't even get me started on Sterling, or potentially the worst of the lot Cucarella. Seriously we forked out 70+ mil on a left back who will do well to not lose his spot to young Lewis. The last 25 mins against Citeh were the best for ages and it was down to the youth on the pitch. Stick with them for the next game against Fulham, start that 11, see what happens. Biggest issue is getting rid of the deadwood. Still no decent keeper at the club, and for god's sake buy a proper finisher. I have no doubt Havertz is a good player, but I have no idea where that position is, even after 2 seasons, it's a bloody joke, I do know it's not as a No9. Potter needs time to build like Arteta at Arsenal. Getting rid now makes no sense, the new guy would face all the same issues as it's the squad that is at the root of our problem.

4 hours ago, JM7 said:

Chelsea’s current injury list:

🚑 Edouard Mendy
🚑 Reece James
🚑 Wesley Fofana
🚑 Ben Chilwell
🚑 N’Golo Kante
🚑 Mason Mount
🚑 Ruben Loftus-Cheek
🚑 Armando Broja
🚑 Raheem Sterling
🚑 Christian Pulisic

This is horrendous and does provide some mitigation. Any manager would struggle with this many injuries to first team players. 

However:

 🚑 Edouard Mendy - Not as good as we hoped - back up keeper at best
🚑 Reece James - Class - best in league
🚑 Wesley Fofana - Injured more than a cheap Hollywood stuntman
🚑 Ben Chilwell - see above
🚑 N’Golo Kante - Class but for how many more seasons?
🚑 Mason Mount - Has lost his way.
🚑 Ruben Loftus-Cheek - Will never quite be good enough
🚑 Armando Broja - see above
🚑 Raheem Sterling - Was never any good and a complete waste of cash.
🚑 Christian Pulisic - See Fofana & Chillers.. different in that when he is fit, I wish he wasn't.

Edited January 6, 20233 yr by ChumpX
i was too lenient on Pulisic.

Players we missed most are James, Chiwell and Kante, whom missed lots of games last season as well, and we still managed somehow, and we were in 4 competitions plus the World Club championship. I still need to be reminded about RLC being a Chelsea player, he's not going to get a start even he's 120% fit. In short, we got lots of injuries, but hardly the worst and not the first time in history

8 hours ago, JM7 said:

Bloody Tuchel, why couldn’t he play the game and please his new bosses. We could have been rebuilding with him at the realm. 

How do you think he could have rebuilt, its his fault we are left with this shambolic squad after a terrible summer of transfers, and we have been on a decline under him for almost 12 months. 

14 minutes ago, dkw said:

How do you think he could have rebuilt, its his fault we are left with this shambolic squad after a terrible summer of transfers, and we have been on a decline under him for almost 12 months. 

Well said.. responsible for 2 of the 3-4 bad transfer windows highlighted by Chumpx, literally lit £370m on fire.

47 minutes ago, ducavis said:

Well said.. responsible for 2 of the 3-4 bad transfer windows highlighted by Chumpx, literally lit £370m on fire.

Wasn't the sporting director in either of the windows.

But yes, of course it was Tuchel! That idiot, what good did he do for the club anyways?

Seeing dkw criticize people for turning on Potter after a few months is hilarious though. He must have forgotten what he did....

Edited January 6, 20233 yr by OriginalS

42 minutes ago, OriginalS said:

Wasn't the sporting director in either of the windows.

But yes, of course it was Tuchel! That idiot, what good did he do for the club anyways?

Seeing dkw criticize people for turning on Potter after a few months is hilarious though. He must have forgotten what he did....

Bloke is the biggest hypocrite on the forum. 

He was constantly spreading negativity on the forum when Tuchel was here, didn't give him a chance from day 1 just because he replaced Lampard. Tuchel had just as many injuries last season as Potter does now, yet he was still winning trophies and getting in cup finals while finishing top 4. Wasn't good enough though because the football was stale in the last 6 months, unlike the amazing Potter ball that we're seeing now. But has the audacity to talk about all the negativity towards Potter 😂

And watch Potter not be blamed for any of the signings should they turn out to be flops. 

Edited January 6, 20233 yr by Victor90

I'd rather miss out of European football completely. Europa would be a better aim as winning that gives you CL football, but I remember we missed out on European football under Jose last season here, then won the league the season after. Not saying we would win it again as the league is far more competitive these days, especially as Pep and Klopp had not long been coaches in the PL when Conte took over. 

Not much is going right for Potter this season. Must be the hardest season he's ever had as a coach. He's been dropped in at the deep end with a club that's been in a perilous situation for a few seasons now, especially domestically. Domestically we are awful and have been for years. We need to figure out why our league form and consistency has been so poor. We've been 19/20 pts off top spot since Conte left. This should not be happening. 

There is probably something to build on from that City defeat.

We have a decent Center Back pairing and a keeper. Not perfect but they won't cost us. Kepa made a mistake in that City's goal but in larger sense he is all right. Our left and right backs are below par however. Positive is we get Chilly and James back in a month. 

In midfield Jorginho and Zakaria are okay. They are not costing us games. Other main fixtures we need. No one else is really helping us. Maybe Kova when he loses that fatigue after world cup. 

The attack is our biggest problem. It stems from lacking fullbacks, inept midfield and structure and quality up front. 

From what Havertz has done since WC he is alright. At number 10 he has done well. 

We have no idea how to break into the box or what to do there. We are not taking shots either. For this amount of quality that is alarming. The same was under TT.

20 minutes ago, evissy said:

There is probably something to build on from that City defeat.

We have a decent Center Back pairing and a keeper. Not perfect but they won't cost us. Kepa made a mistake in that City's goal but in larger sense he is all right. Our left and right backs are below par however. Positive is we get Chilly and James back in a month. 

In midfield Jorginho and Zakaria are okay. They are not costing us games. Other main fixtures we need. No one else is really helping us. Maybe Kova when he loses that fatigue after world cup. 

The attack is our biggest problem. It stems from lacking fullbacks, inept midfield and structure and quality up front. 

From what Havertz has done since WC he is alright. At number 10 he has done well. 

We have no idea how to break into the box or what to do there. We are not taking shots either. For this amount of quality that is alarming. The same was under TT.

If the players you mentioned are alright, then the last paragraph alludes to a coaching issue, right? 

How can a midfield pairing be both alright and inept? 

I’m sure the club would disagree but missing out on European football wouldn’t be the worst thing. It would allow Potter whole weeks to train the squad. 

1 hour ago, Victor90 said:

Bloke is the biggest hypocrite on the forum. 

He was constantly spreading negativity on the forum when Tuchel was here, didn't give him a chance from day 1 just because he replaced Lampard. Tuchel had just as many injuries last season as Potter does now, yet he was still winning trophies and getting in cup finals while finishing top 4. Wasn't good enough though because the football was stale in the last 6 months, unlike the amazing Potter ball that we're seeing now. But has the audacity to talk about all the negativity towards Potter 😂

And watch Potter not be blamed for any of the signings should they turn out to be flops. 

Yeah, I don't want to call out anyone specific too much but if you as a poster (generally speaking) have been throwing stones at a certain manager for a long, long time and then take the holier than thou approach when a new manager comes in and gets criticized for our having us on the worst league run since 1999 you will look more than a bit ridiculous.

Anyways, moving on. It's no wonder we aren't scoring any goals anymore when we play like this. Was literally screaming at the telly yesterday because look at all that space for Auba.

 

Potter is never going to be Guardiola levels, but he is not a bad manager either. Haven't watched a lot of his Brighton against the lesser clubs, but I have watched maybe more than a dozen against the so called big clubs and Brighton always played a nice brand of football and looked impressive for a team of their stature.

Now Potter's impact here has been minimal and we look like a mid table club. I'm not saying "Give Potter this, give him that, next season we will fight for the league title" because nobody knows this for a făcut. Maybe he will win the title, maybe we will look even worse than we do know.

But one thing I know for sure is this current squad is bang average and no manager in this world would make this dross play at the level some would imagine they should. 

I mean there are only 5 world class players in this squad and 3 of them are injured lol - Chilwell, James and Kante. Others are simply average and I really don't understand how people that own so much money and are in charge of so many successful business can spend absurd money (transfer fees + salaries) on Cucurella and Sterling.

Apart from Kovacic, none of the other midfielders and attacking players should be starting next season. I am absolutely sure that of all the top 15 clubs in Europe, we have the worst set of midfielders and attacking players and it's not even a debate. None of our midfielders can score and they're all pretty much bang average, there is no world class wingers in this squad and believe it or not a club of Chelsea's calibre has no decent centre forward to rely on. I mean a washed up Aubameyang and Havertz, an attacking midfielder turned false 9... Jesus Christ (/facepalm).

This squad needs so many new players it makes things boil in my head just thinking about it. If the new owners are clever they'd already be on the phone trying to sign at least two new world class players THIS transfer window and then go back in the market in the summer and sign another 3 or 4. Otherwise the best we can hope for a new title challenge is probably in 4 or 5 seasons.

What we need is a WC midfielder, a WC winger (granted Nkunku is the other one and already signed), a WC creative, attacking midfielder and a top centre forward. The front line should be totally reshuffled. 

KEPA - James, Fofana, new CB?, Chilwell - Kovacic, new WC mid - Nkunku, new WC AM, new WC winger - new WC CF.

Until we sign a bunch of new top players we could have Guardiola manage us and still be as bad as we are. Potter is not in the top 10 of managers, but IMHO the quality of the squad does not help his cause either. This is hands down one of the worst squad I've seen as a Chelsea fan. It's simply filled with past it players and bang average ones.

 

 

 

 

Echoing a lot of others on here but calling for Potter to go is outrageous although not surprising. 
 

there are 1000s of posts on this forum from the past few seasons rightly stating issues with the squad. Players not good enough etc etc. it’s the same players mostly what does everyone expect?

new owners made a few naive signings in the summer but hopefully with the new recruitment team we have a plan now and those errors will at worst reduce a fair bit.

let’s give potter a few transfer windows to get a squad he wants, without all the players we know are past it and see what he does. Otherwise we’re about 2 sackings away from appointing Sam Allerdyce