So it's Pochettino *Officially Chelsea Manager*

[Gol15]

27 minutes ago, The Rising Sun said:

When we lost 3-0 away to Sheffield United under Lampard he said " they were stronger than us physically and mentally". 

It's the same story been going on for fecking years.

Don't they get embarrassed seeing teams all over the league, even at the bottom playing quick, fast , commited, brave football ?

That passage of play yesterday with a multitude of passes and going nowhere was typical 

 

 

Or it just speaks about how Lampard was a poor manager... Bottom line, like Pochettino is, maybe.

Sheffield's team is valued at 130-140m, they are effectively a Championship squad, Enzo and Caicedo should be solving these matches by themselves. But they can't.

[axman2526]

Poch, and by proxy us, are very lucky we are talking about 5 points from the last 9, when it should have been 0.

1. 10 man for a half Burnley have Rodriguez miss an open goal volley right at the end of the game.

2. If Dalot keeps his balance no pen, no 82 second comeback. 

3. Sheff United bossed us for most of the game, and should have found a late winner bit messed it up like Rodriguez did.

 

That's the state of this team under Poch.

[The Rising Sun]

2 hours ago, Gol15 said:

Or it just speaks about how Lampard was a poor manager... Bottom line, like Pochettino is, maybe.

Sheffield's team is valued at 130-140m, they are effectively a Championship squad, Enzo and Caicedo should be solving these matches by themselves. But they can't.

"Thomas Tuchel: Chelsea are 'mentally and physically tired' says Blues ..."

We've been haunted by slow, passionless football under different managers, starting with Sarri !

That quote is after 1-1 draw at Brighton. 

Edited April 8 by The Rising Sun
Info

[Dubair]

I highly doubt he’s the man to turn it around long term but I don’t see the point in sacking him with 6 weeks left to go in the season, don’t want a repeat of the end of last season.

I’d see if he can put some defensive structure in the team between now and then and how we go against Man City in the cup. 

If he is sacked, who do people think is a realistic option ? Amorim is going to Liverpool and I think Tuchel is a non runner. 

[timetowaste]

42 minutes ago, The Rising Sun said:

"Thomas Tuchel: Chelsea are 'mentally and physically tired' says Blues ..."

We've been haunted by slow, passionless football under different managers, starting with Sarri !

That quote is after 1-1 draw at Brighton. 

Ah yes the manager the fans hounded out after an easy top 4 finish and a Europa league trophy in his first season.

[timetowaste]

20 minutes ago, Dubair said:

I highly doubt he’s the man to turn it around long term but I don’t see the point in sacking him with 6 weeks left to go in the season, don’t want a repeat of the end of last season.

I’d see if he can put some defensive structure in the team between now and then and how we go against Man City in the cup. 

If he is sacked, who do people think is a realistic option ? Amorim is going to Liverpool and I think Tuchel is a non runner. 

I thought there would be no point in sacking Poch now as well, but then I thought about it more we genuinely have nothing to lose. Somehow we still in with a shout of getting Europa league football next season. But that being said, I don't think Poch will get us there because he's not good enough. The difference between this squad and the last squad is everyone had downed tools with most of them knowing they were being shipped out. If we could bring in a manager in the interim that has some sort of tactical awareness and we could finish 6th which, as sh*t as it sounds, it's good for us financially and helps attract better players and a better manager next season.

[Scott]

5 hours ago, JM7 said:

I don’t think Poch is the long term answer but he isn’t the problem. There are issues beyond him which need sorting. For example,

1. Not being able to fix the number of long term injuries 

2. Recruitment - not being good enough. Most of the players that we’ve bought ok/good. They’re not elite. 

I saw this tweet below which summed it up. 
 

“When you spend £25m on 3rd choice Brighton keeper & $15m on 3rd choice Serbia keeper, you're not buying élite. They're not bad, but not prime Mendy, Courtois, Cech. They cost points. And that's where we are“

 

This is on the sporting directors. 

I agree with this 100% but has Poch improved any players game? There's no organization, no system I can see other than f**king playing out of the back with inexperienced young players. The team looks as lost on the pitch now as it did last August. So yes Chelsea have bought a lot of decent young players and I guess the plan was for Poch to make them elite but that's not happening. Interesting that our best player came from six years in Pep's system. Who knew Brighton players wouldn't be as talented- oh wait we all did. The players are not going so Mauricio has to.

[strider6004]

I think we are too kneejerk steeped recently in the glories of silverware to acknowledge that though Poch is not doing well just throwing a new face will magically turn us around, just recall Lampard for his second stint.

We had three first team defenders out for the Blades and still did not lose away.

I did not like his starting eleven and thought he left it too late for the subs yet that is not a sacking offence for me.

 

Edited April 8 by strider6004

[El regreso]

Watch until till the end of the video about 35 seconds, “tell me he didn’t just say that”

 

[The Rising Sun]

1 hour ago, timetowaste said:

Ah yes the manager the fans hounded out after an easy top 4 finish and a Europa league trophy in his first season.

Yeah, but no one could stomach the football we played. . Little did we know then that there was a lot lot worse to come.

Personally I hated the way we played , the Europa final though was superb. 

[Sconnie Blue]

25 minutes ago, El regreso said:

Watch until till the end of the video about 35 seconds, “tell me he didn’t just say that”

 

Kyle Walker went into detail on Rio's podcast that the biggest change from playing under Poch to then moving to Pep, was his understanding of the game. 

[Ernie_blue]

59 minutes ago, strider6004 said:

I think we are too kneejerk steeped recently in the glories of silverware to acknowledge that though Poch is not doing well just throwing a new face will magically turn us around, just recall Lampard for his second stint.

We had three first team defenders out for the Blades and still did not lose away.

I did not like his starting eleven and thought he left it too late for the subs yet that is not a sacking offence for me.

 

You work for Poch's pr team, that is some weird point of view.

[ALTE]

15 minutes ago, Sconnie Blue said:

Kyle Walker went into detail on Rio's podcast that the biggest change from playing under Poch to then moving to Pep, was his understanding of the game. 

Watching that video clip, its no wonder we have no clue what so ever but yet some players jump to his defence. No point sacking him right now imo, but he must go once this season is done.

[Sexyfootball]

3 hours ago, axman2526 said:

Poch, and by proxy us, are very lucky we are talking about 5 points from the last 9, when it should have been 0.

1. 10 man for a half Burnley have Rodriguez miss an open goal volley right at the end of the game.

2. If Dalot keeps his balance no pen, no 82 second comeback. 

3. Sheff United bossed us for most of the game, and should have found a late winner bit messed it up like Rodriguez did.

 

That's the state of this team under Poch.

Good that things have improved vs last season when we lost three out of our four games against the bottom two sides ... two wins and two draws this year ! 

[axman2526]

Just now, Sexyfootball said:

Good that things have improved vs last season when we lost three out of our four games against the bottom two sides ... two wins and two draws this year ! 

Difference between last year and this year?

[LongtimerLurker]

Seems pretty simple to me top 6/Europa League football or the sack nothing else should save him. You could argue conference league and I won't lie that does intrigue me we're so bad that it's not a given we win that competition especially since its looking like we won't even get in. More positively though if we did play in it and win I believe that would make us the first team to win all European competitions and again we can say we've won it all, but no one else could.

[Gol15]

2 hours ago, The Rising Sun said:

"Thomas Tuchel: Chelsea are 'mentally and physically tired' says Blues ..."

We've been haunted by slow, passionless football under different managers, starting with Sarri !

That quote is after 1-1 draw at Brighton. 

Not sure what Sarri has to do with it, but I believe that it was Jose's squad that started to really show a serious lack of any real motivation, mental strength and so on...

I'm guessing someone could find those examples even prior to the 2015's, though prior to that season where the players gave up and finished 10th we haven't really had that problem, only in the most recent few seasons we're looking as uninspired as 2015/16 and finishing around the 10th position points out to that similarity.

 

[Sconnie Blue]

Selling Costa and Terry retiring did so much damage. 

Edited April 8 by Sconnie Blue

[dkw]

2 hours ago, El regreso said:

Watch until till the end of the video about 35 seconds, “tell me he didn’t just say that”

 

Dear God that's abysmal, no wonder we look clueless, we're managed by bloody Neil from the young ones.

[Sconnie Blue]

Just now, dkw said:

Dear God that's abysmal, no wonder we look clueless, we're managed by bloody Neil from the young ones.

Makes you wonder if that’s what he pitched to the directors in the interview process. 
 

Shocking. 

[WhiteWall]

8 hours ago, Sconnie Blue said:

Depends on the frame of reference. 

Is this squad capable of finishing Top 4? No. The sporting directors did a poor job building a squad if that was the intended goal. 

Is this squad capable finishing in a Europa League position (now that 7th grants it), and more importantly, capable of beating relegation sides like Burnley and Sheffield United? Absolutely. 

The problem is we are still thinking in footballing terms. What if they're not. What if the model is financial and not footballing. Selling off assets such as Maatsen, Hall, Chalobah, Broja, James, Colwill, Datro Fofana, Palmer, Hutchinson, all at either 100% profit or at major increases on their book cost whilst having replacements working their way through. Its not football and may destroy our relationship with the club even further, but what if this is the model that they are working towards.

[Sconnie Blue]

2 hours ago, WhiteWall said:

The problem is we are still thinking in footballing terms. What if they're not. What if the model is financial and not footballing. Selling off assets such as Maatsen, Hall, Chalobah, Broja, James, Colwill, Datro Fofana, Palmer, Hutchinson, all at either 100% profit or at major increases on their book cost whilst having replacements working their way through. Its not football and may destroy our relationship with the club even further, but what if this is the model that they are working towards.

Not sure I believe that just yet. 
 

James declared untouchable amidst Real Madrid interest. 
New improved Palmer contract on the horizon. 

Seems ownership will protect the valuable ones. 

[19seventyone]

The fact that we run less than every other team in the league is worrying.

Our record against teams in the bottom 6 is also really worrying.

Despite numerous defeats to these teams the team has basically played the same way again and again and not learning from experience.

We can absolutely be a handful when we play with real tempo and in transition but when we are more or less given the ball against the “lesser” teams we turn into a geriatric walking football team.

The players have to be better than that no matter how Poch sets them up but ultimately it’s his job to get us better than that.

 

 

[evissy]

10 hours ago, dkw said:

Dear God that's abysmal, no wonder we look clueless, we're managed by bloody Neil from the young ones.

This could also be misinterpreted. His English is not perfect. He may just respond to the talk about formations in general. We and people in general around football talk about formations a ton, he just wants to emphasize it is lot less important than it is credited. Tuchel also said formation is irrelevant. 3 at Back or 4 at back doesn't matter, what matters how you play in it. 

And I think this organic style is his style. I have felt all the time he lets players learn and express themselves. Time Will tell if it works or if that is something the club wants.

[strider6004]

13 hours ago, Ernie_blue said:

You work for Poch's pr team, that is some weird point of view.

No I've said before don't think he will bring us silverware.

Do think with Gusto and Colwill back we improve straight away.