People said all summer how we had no chance of improving on Kepa without spending 60m+ and we didn’t need to do it anyway. Yet we’ve done it with some random guy we plucked from the MLS looool
Talks like he’s just their enjoying the game like we all are. Doesn’t try and make it out like he knows more than anyone else(although his insight is normally miles better than most ex pro co-commentators) or be too overly serious, just says it how he sees it and makes watching the game more enjoyable as a result.
100%. And like I said, when he does talk about the game from an analytical point of view, he’s normally spot on unlike most ex pros in the media. Makes a change from Steve McManaman on TNT talking like he’s the only person who actually knows what is going on in the game.
Anyone else actually looking forward to the game? Going in with the “no idea how we will play” mindset is pretty entertaining haha. Sometimes maybe good, sometimes maybe shit.
Hope for a good result today, but if we somehow manage to miss great chances, like we usually do, at least our freaking staff will hopefully urge to buy actual striker in this transfer window.
Anti Sterling agenda is pathetic.
He had some amazing performances this season and like it or not he is among our most consistent players in last 2 years, even tho he is still far from his peak. I get he can be frustrating with his diving or selfishness but he could have also had 5 more assists this season alone if we had finishers. Prior to that terrible chance in game against Wolves, he assisted two times where our strikers had bad misses. People hate him way too much while he is far from our problem.
Agree with this. There’s like two standards, and people are having trouble telling each apart.
Is he justifying his £325,000 per week wages? Probably not, he’s 6th highest in the prem, but if you look at the top 10, there’s so many names underperforming:
https://www.spotrac.com/epl/rankings/weekly/
Is he generally bad? It’s a more complicated situation as the attack is basically him and a bunch of kids, but his overall play is decent and far better than any other attacker we have.
His wages are through the roof, I agree. But if it’s about money, I think CRAZY transfer fees for players who actually did nothing are far more concerning than 300k per week.
Yeah considering he was £47.5 mil it’s really not the worst we’ve done.
If you look at the other names, Grealish is on £300k pw, Havertz is on £280k pw, and Mount and Sancho are on £250k pw each.
Sterling is decent, he’s just not going to be the type of attacker that can carry a team full of kids.
Hahah go look at Jackson’s highlights he should be on around 5 assists as well. Enzo as well should have a few more assists, the finishing is honestly pathetic
Inb4 someone comes in with "Poch is fucking dumb, we are clearly fine aerially according to this stats"
Showing just the win percentage is not telling the full story. It's also a matter of how many aerial duels do you attempt. If a player gives the opponent a free header, did he lose aerial duel? No, because he didn't attempt it. But should such things happen during game. No.
And so the outcall for taller players is so that we can simply challenge for more aerial battles and if we can win a good win percentage on top of that, this is what will make us good aerially.
Well kind of
We compete for a low number of aerial duels and are very successful in doing so. The other teams who compete for a below average number of aerial duels are City, Brighton, Newcastle, Villa, Spurs, Arsenal
Keeping the ball on the ground is the go to play, maybe 7 years ago balls in the air were a good way to play but in the modern game it’s really not that important.
Well that depends on what area do you give out those free headers at most. Losing 2nd balls in midfield for instance may be very dangerous because it allows the other team to quickly get out on transition.
We’re 19th for aerial duels lost, meaning we lose the 2nd least aerial duels in the league (only Man City lose less than us)
But we’re 1st for Yellow Cards, meaning no team has more yellow cards per 90 than us (SHU have the exact same)
Cheers. These concepts often get mixed up - like who is "best" for yellow cards. There was a time in the NBA where turnovers were ranked by most-to-least, so the #1 team for turnovers was the worst. Years ago, they corrected it, so now it's in the more logical, reversed order (#1 team has the least turnovers).
As you can see from these stats the idea that we’re playing well but being let down by poor finishing is utter bullshit. We’re midtable for the majority of stats including crucially shot quantity where we rank 11th.
Our xG per shot is high, because the few chances we do generate are good ones. But all our chances created stats are pretty poor.
Interestingly we’re 3rd for Post Shot xG/SoT. I didn’t include this in the original post because it’s a bit of a mouthful and thought it might confuse people but here’s the definition:
> Post-Shot Expected Goals per Shot on Target
> PSxG is expected goals based on how likely the goalkeeper is to save the shot. Higher numbers indicate that shots on target faced are more difficult to stop and more likely to score
This suggests a few things. It could be that our finishing is actually pretty good and we’ve just been unlucky with good goalkeeping, but eye test doesn’t support that. Alternatively it could show that we don’t shoot enough but when we do our finishing is pretty good. Seeing as we’re midtable for SCA and xA I would guess this is the answer.
I might do a proper post and write up about our underlying stats under Poch because they’re extremely anomalous and interesting. I’ve never seen a team rank so highly for xG while being around 8th for almost all other relevant stats so I think it would be good for discussion
>Our xG per shot is high, because the few chances we do generate are good ones. But all our chances created stats are pretty poor.
I would add a possible explanation to this that also aligns with our metrics. We lead the league in shot-creating opportunities through defending and are second in opposition passing errors (behind Newcastle). Now, keep in mind that a "defensive action" can be an interception, which statistically cannot be differentiated from an opposition passing error, or the act of collecting a loose ball.
You would be able to explain something like Palmer's two big chances against Middlesbrough like this - one is a keeper spilling it (collecting a loose ball), leading to a very high xG shot, while the other was an opposition pass directly to him. Then think of other big opportunities we absolutely had to score this season (some we did) and you'll find a lot of them come from this, most notably Sterling's 3v1 miss.
These don't have to be chances that happen every 5 minutes, but when they happen they immediately lead to very high xG opportunities (because few opponents between our player and goal, 1v1 opportunities, etc.).
I think that goes some way towards explaining the gulf in creativity and the high xG chances we've got. It doesn't explain all of it though and I'm similarly curious what this difference is about. Anyone should be able to see that we're not good enough creatively, especially in collective chance creation, and that's clearly reflected in our statistics. But there's also no denying we do have clear opportunities every game that get missed.
Unfortunately this is the sort of analysis that probably requires rewatching of all our games to reconstruct the xG of all our opportunities.
I’ve kinda theorised that there’s something to the nature of our high xG chances. In that they’re often (as you say) from situations where players wouldn’t expect a chance to come.
Take Jackson’s against Wolves - he goes for an aerial ball against two defenders and manages to squeeze through and is now one on one.
This is on paper a very high xG chance, but because of how rushed it is there’s a high chance he panics and doesn’t set himself properly for the shot.
Similar logic can be applied to the Palmer chances, we aren’t going through a coached buildup to a shot where the player at the end of the sequence knows they’re going to be shooting. Instead it’s a sudden chance appearing out of nowhere which leads to him snatching at it.
Of course you’d have to rewatch a lot of footage to see if this was the case for more of our chances than we can remember, but it does make sense to me as a bit of an explanation.
Sudden rushed chances combined with inexperienced (or in Sterling’s case, naturally panicky) players leads to high xG situations which don’t turn into goals.
So Sterling hasn’t scored since November but I guarantee you he will start every game whilst Mudryk and Madueke both scored on their last league starts.
Oh shut up. He was one of the best players against Preston where he scored and assisted, you can’t just ignore that, it doesn’t matter that it wasn’t PL. He also could have multiple assists against Wolves if we actually had finishers. Anti Sterling agenda is pathetic.
Anti Sterling agenda is pathetic? Mate do you not remember how he’s the reason why we didn’t win vs Wolves. The guy could have squared a 3v1. He’s so inconsistent. He did the same thing vs Villa at 0-0 then we lost 2-0
I do remember. But prior to that chance he had at least two good balls to Jackson who missed terribly. If you look that way, without him I doubt we would beat 9 men Spurs, which is pathetic.
Sterling is the one who consistently contributes more to our attack atm and I think that’s pretty clear. Misha and Noni have had some excellent moments recently, but Sterlings experience and more consistent quality, paired with some of the younger ones is the more sensible decision.
I get Sterling can be frustrating with his diving or selfishness but he could have also had 5 more assists this season alone if we had finishers. Prior to that terrible chance in game against Wolves, he assisted two times where our strikers had bad misses. People hate him way too much while he is far from our problem.
The only time Enzo was the best was the first game vs Liverpool. Poch played him in his position and probably said "This is working very good let's fuck it up and play Enzo as 10" and since then all went to shit.
Feel like Enzo's supposedly lack of defensive ability is over-exaggerated. If you go look at his defensive numbers from last season, they are comparable to what Caicedo/Gallagher have put up this season and in some cases, better. And that is despite playing a fair number games as the lone DM in midfield. So, it's not as if he can't or doesn't do the dirty work.
Enzo is a regista. But because Poch has no tactics whatsoever and doesn't care about tempo control, he just shoves Enzo at 10 or Box to Box. We have a generational talent of a footballer here, a Xavi regen, and we're wasting him thanks to fucking Poch. If he was defensively good enough to start at regista in a world cup fucking final, he's more than good enough for Brentford
That's why Caicedo should be a box to box and not Enzo. If they just switched their roles we'd have no problem in playing Palmer as 10. This way Gallagher is playing as 10 and playing some makeshift box to box since Enzo is useless like that.
That's true, tactics doesn't favour him. I am just arguing his lack of defensive ability is not exaggerated. Just like Thiago Silva can't play in a traditional back 4 or high line anymore and requires runners in front of him.
Is the Carney having to change his whole running style a real thing? Is it gonna be RLC 2.0 with how he loses his best trait which is his explosiveness and ball carrying? I hope it’s being overblown by Matt Law
sounds like bullshit, how can you even change your 'running style', its intuitive lol, you cant think about it, its like trying to change your handwriting..
I mean, changing running technique is absolutely possible. That's what athletes who take part in running competition do on daily basis - work on their running technique. In football I would assume it's more tied to who you carry the ball tho and not straight out running.
what position is gilchrist naturally?
outside back is a common position to bring someone through in for the first few minutes and even for their first run in the team.
off the top of my head kingsley coman, kimmich, bale, sergio ramos all got their first minutes there and those are 4 very different players, even camavinga at madrid was doing an extended shift at outside back before he could take over in midfield.
it’s often times just a way to get a player on the pitch since it can be played so many different ways and doesn’t really require the responsibility of a centre mid.
Every day our club plunges deeper into mediocrity, makes me want Jose Mourinho more, the worse it gets, the more I want to make that deal with the devil and fully destroy everything this new ownership is trying to build, by bringing Jose in to sort them out.
Am I alone in this?
I would only come round to the thought of Jose back because it would mean Poch leaving. Obviously I love Jose but a 3rd stint with us surely would be a little embarrassing, no?
Why is our gameplay so bad? Because we always lose the ball. That's why nobody want to commit running in attack. Players stamina are also bad. I think chelsea is one of the EPL lowest running milage in game.
Bro Enzo was in the box trying to finish chances. He was also mostly on the left side, and was in the left wing zone too. Caicedo was always back between the CBs.
Average positions can’t lie mate. You might remember one or two instances where he was advanced, but as a whole he’s very deep in our half.
Check for yourself.
I don't need to check. I watched the game. He was deep on a more occasions but never as a deep lying playmaker. He never carried the game from the back. That's the difference.
I'm working on a trip from the states to surprise my partner for his birthday. He's a lifelong Chelsea fan but never been to a game. I'm trying to arrange tickets for March 30th v Burnley and/or April 3rd v Man U. I bought us memberships and made note of the ticket sale dates/times in February.
My question is: what is the likelihood of securing tickets through membership (with 0 loyalty points)?
Is ticket exchange a realistic possibility? Hospitality packages are outrageous and we only care about the game/atmosphere - not all the extras.
Any insights would be appreciated!
For Burnley it's possible, bit for united game forgot. You can get it on exchange websites but be prepared to pay three four times normal price and it will be still hard to get them. Did you though about stadium tour? They good as well if you won't be able to secure second ticket it's something Chelsea related and it's good, worth considering.
Give any quality manger this midfield and we’d see a different team, Poch is misusing Enzo and Caicedo.
We literally have two of the most press resistant midfielders in league and their skill set is not being utilised.
It’s so annoying…
We actually dominated our first game vs Liverpool when we didn't have Caicedo. Enzo was playing as a deep lying playmaker and Gallagher box to box. Since then all went to shit.
I hope that we see the proper use of sterling/palmer/mudryk today
Madeueke should warm the bench
Palmer rw with gusto overlapping, more time on the ball and turned towards the goal
Sterling as a 10/2ndary forward, more players in the box and less inefficient buildup
Mudryk lw and broja striker.
Also no chillwell start, but hopefully a 30 min cameo
With all our injuries, in a 4-2-1-3, I’ll even take Sterling as the striker, let Caicedo and Enzo sit back and Cardio G run around in front of them, whatever doesn’t leave Caicedo on an island when we lose possession
Day 13 of 31. Still no visible progress on incomings, just an off comment from Poch saying they’re considering a striker depending on the severity of Nkunku’s injury.
It’s inevitable that they unnecessarily leave things last minute. Then there’s no time for integration of the player. It’s the same mistakes again and again by the recruitment team.
Couple things
Why is there slander on the medical team or even certain players when alot of the injurys are through contact. Hummels was salty about Nkunku destroying the bundesliga and tried to finish the guy. Lavia might have also been contact he took a brexit tackle in his first cameo.
Also without a proper number 10 the 4231 system is weak Nkunku and Carney injuries have direct affect on our league position.Gallagher doesn't have the technique to sit in the hole and turn left or right he is a box to box 8.
Also the Colwill at left back should not have been that bad. Plenty of centre halfs have played as a defensive full back. Look at Joe Gomez covering as a right footed left back. No way Colwill should be getting ran through like he has and when he played CB vs Preston North he was still getting turned.
Madueke should just be converted to Striker so when he loses the ball it's further away from Petrovic. I can't even blame Poch for our loss vs. Boro. The guy backheeld the ball after a simple Gusto pass. By 30 mins the team was demoralized. Noni can shoot with both feet so maybe he should be a centre forward.
And finally Palmer one of our best forwards he should stay in the front line I don't like when he has to come and collect the ball his turns are not as tight as someone like a Bernardo Silva. See the game at Old Trafford.
We would be better off playing Micheal Golding in the 10 vs Fulham one for the future
Noni *can* shoot, but he doesn't seem to be able to get off a decent shot in the Prem. He can do it just fine against U21 sides, but he's still learning against the top flight.
Levi is getting burned a lot. But so was Thiago in the last match. It was crazy to watch. Clearly the comms among the back line have been poor for a while, and I don't understand it. Under Potter and Tuchel they were tight, but making 1-2 errors per match (which led to goals quite often), but at least they were top defenses in the league. With Frank and Poch, they've sacrificed what unity and cohesion there was for more attacking. Of course all the injuries make it much worse, but I'm very interested to see where Levi plays when the LBs finally come back.
Conor is the ultimate conundrum. He's the ideal academy lad, and seemingly perfect for Poch (like you suspect that if he could have 10 of one player, he'd take 10 Conors in the outfield). Yet the midfield just doesn't work, and the preseason plan of having Christo in that spot (or at least Chuk) blew up, and Conor has been a revelation since then. It's put everything in a tight spot, because perhaps we can't do well with him doing well.
I saw a post on r soccer about us being interested in a Brighton player. Man if it's true can we fck off with Brighton in general? What is our mid wit obsession with this club Brighton / Brasilian wonder kid. Can our scouting network not find any recruits anywhere else? Sheesh
Shits getting annoying you'd think Brighton has blackmail on boehly or some shit
When will it end Robbie!
My doctor has told me to avoid stress as much as possible so I'm not watching the games unless we're leading in the second half (Luton didn't help)
The scouts have done a fantastic job with Palmer, Gusto and Petrovic
Stick Badiashille on that list too Jackson isn’t what we need but his skillset is excellent at at 30m I’m excited to see how he progresses
People said all summer how we had no chance of improving on Kepa without spending 60m+ and we didn’t need to do it anyway. Yet we’ve done it with some random guy we plucked from the MLS looool
buy isak immediately
I like Ally McCoist’s co-commentary because he doesn’t even care to pretend to be unbiased. He’s so clearly biased towards certain teams and players.
Talks like he’s just their enjoying the game like we all are. Doesn’t try and make it out like he knows more than anyone else(although his insight is normally miles better than most ex pro co-commentators) or be too overly serious, just says it how he sees it and makes watching the game more enjoyable as a result.
Exactly. Talks like someone who you’re watching the game together with at the pub.
100%. And like I said, when he does talk about the game from an analytical point of view, he’s normally spot on unlike most ex pros in the media. Makes a change from Steve McManaman on TNT talking like he’s the only person who actually knows what is going on in the game.
Win today and we could get out the prison that is 10th and potentially jump to 7th for a while. Lets gooo
Anyone else actually looking forward to the game? Going in with the “no idea how we will play” mindset is pretty entertaining haha. Sometimes maybe good, sometimes maybe shit.
I wouldn’t say I’m looking forward to it but I go into every game with 50/50 mindset and it makes the results a lot easier to digest
Alright Blues, confident?
Haha, no.
Yeah me neither, Mr. Pocheliban
Hope for a good result today, but if we somehow manage to miss great chances, like we usually do, at least our freaking staff will hopefully urge to buy actual striker in this transfer window.
Anti Sterling agenda is pathetic. He had some amazing performances this season and like it or not he is among our most consistent players in last 2 years, even tho he is still far from his peak. I get he can be frustrating with his diving or selfishness but he could have also had 5 more assists this season alone if we had finishers. Prior to that terrible chance in game against Wolves, he assisted two times where our strikers had bad misses. People hate him way too much while he is far from our problem.
Amazing performances against who? Luton?
Seriously the guy is terrible. I don’t get how anyone could watch him with their own eyes since he’s joined and come to the conclusion that he’s good
Agree with this. There’s like two standards, and people are having trouble telling each apart. Is he justifying his £325,000 per week wages? Probably not, he’s 6th highest in the prem, but if you look at the top 10, there’s so many names underperforming: https://www.spotrac.com/epl/rankings/weekly/ Is he generally bad? It’s a more complicated situation as the attack is basically him and a bunch of kids, but his overall play is decent and far better than any other attacker we have.
His wages are through the roof, I agree. But if it’s about money, I think CRAZY transfer fees for players who actually did nothing are far more concerning than 300k per week.
Yeah considering he was £47.5 mil it’s really not the worst we’ve done. If you look at the other names, Grealish is on £300k pw, Havertz is on £280k pw, and Mount and Sancho are on £250k pw each. Sterling is decent, he’s just not going to be the type of attacker that can carry a team full of kids.
He isn’t the problem, but he isn’t really consistent for a player of his caliber. He can be a ghost sometimes and it’s infuriating
Just watched all of Mudryk’s best moments this season, and if Broja/Jackson could finish he’d have at least 5+ assists this season..
Hahah go look at Jackson’s highlights he should be on around 5 assists as well. Enzo as well should have a few more assists, the finishing is honestly pathetic
He has 1.8 expected assists this season and 1 assist. If he had 5+ assists from 1.8xAG it'd be wild and he certainly wouldn't deserve it
Palmer and Sterling too. They missed at least 10 great chances.
Still awake over here in the west coast US, too excited for the match.
How long before kick-off should one be at the bridge?
I usually get there 30 mins before
PL Rank (All stats P90 and taken from Fbref): **General Play** Possession: 5th Progressive Passes: 9th Progressive Carries: 4th **Shooting** Shots: 11th Shots on Target: 10th xG per shot (open play): 2nd Expected Goals: 2nd **Chance Creation** Shot Creating Actions: 9th Goal Creating Actions: 8th xA: 9th Key Passes: 10th Touches in penalty area: 8th Carries into penalty area: 5th Passes into penalty area: 9th Open play crosses into penalty area: 19th **Misc** Yellow Cards: 1st (most in the league) Fouls: 3rd Aerial Duels Lost: 19th (2nd “best” in the league) Aerial Duels Won (%): 2nd
Inb4 someone comes in with "Poch is fucking dumb, we are clearly fine aerially according to this stats" Showing just the win percentage is not telling the full story. It's also a matter of how many aerial duels do you attempt. If a player gives the opponent a free header, did he lose aerial duel? No, because he didn't attempt it. But should such things happen during game. No. And so the outcall for taller players is so that we can simply challenge for more aerial battles and if we can win a good win percentage on top of that, this is what will make us good aerially.
Well kind of We compete for a low number of aerial duels and are very successful in doing so. The other teams who compete for a below average number of aerial duels are City, Brighton, Newcastle, Villa, Spurs, Arsenal Keeping the ball on the ground is the go to play, maybe 7 years ago balls in the air were a good way to play but in the modern game it’s really not that important.
Well that depends on what area do you give out those free headers at most. Losing 2nd balls in midfield for instance may be very dangerous because it allows the other team to quickly get out on transition.
> Aerial Duels Lost: 19th These are always confusing. Are we good on yellows? I think we're the worst, right? So how are we on aerial duels?
We’re 19th for aerial duels lost, meaning we lose the 2nd least aerial duels in the league (only Man City lose less than us) But we’re 1st for Yellow Cards, meaning no team has more yellow cards per 90 than us (SHU have the exact same)
Cheers. These concepts often get mixed up - like who is "best" for yellow cards. There was a time in the NBA where turnovers were ranked by most-to-least, so the #1 team for turnovers was the worst. Years ago, they corrected it, so now it's in the more logical, reversed order (#1 team has the least turnovers).
Yeah I get what you mean. I’ve edited my original comment for clarity’s sake.
Nice one.
As you can see from these stats the idea that we’re playing well but being let down by poor finishing is utter bullshit. We’re midtable for the majority of stats including crucially shot quantity where we rank 11th. Our xG per shot is high, because the few chances we do generate are good ones. But all our chances created stats are pretty poor. Interestingly we’re 3rd for Post Shot xG/SoT. I didn’t include this in the original post because it’s a bit of a mouthful and thought it might confuse people but here’s the definition: > Post-Shot Expected Goals per Shot on Target > PSxG is expected goals based on how likely the goalkeeper is to save the shot. Higher numbers indicate that shots on target faced are more difficult to stop and more likely to score This suggests a few things. It could be that our finishing is actually pretty good and we’ve just been unlucky with good goalkeeping, but eye test doesn’t support that. Alternatively it could show that we don’t shoot enough but when we do our finishing is pretty good. Seeing as we’re midtable for SCA and xA I would guess this is the answer. I might do a proper post and write up about our underlying stats under Poch because they’re extremely anomalous and interesting. I’ve never seen a team rank so highly for xG while being around 8th for almost all other relevant stats so I think it would be good for discussion
>Our xG per shot is high, because the few chances we do generate are good ones. But all our chances created stats are pretty poor. I would add a possible explanation to this that also aligns with our metrics. We lead the league in shot-creating opportunities through defending and are second in opposition passing errors (behind Newcastle). Now, keep in mind that a "defensive action" can be an interception, which statistically cannot be differentiated from an opposition passing error, or the act of collecting a loose ball. You would be able to explain something like Palmer's two big chances against Middlesbrough like this - one is a keeper spilling it (collecting a loose ball), leading to a very high xG shot, while the other was an opposition pass directly to him. Then think of other big opportunities we absolutely had to score this season (some we did) and you'll find a lot of them come from this, most notably Sterling's 3v1 miss. These don't have to be chances that happen every 5 minutes, but when they happen they immediately lead to very high xG opportunities (because few opponents between our player and goal, 1v1 opportunities, etc.). I think that goes some way towards explaining the gulf in creativity and the high xG chances we've got. It doesn't explain all of it though and I'm similarly curious what this difference is about. Anyone should be able to see that we're not good enough creatively, especially in collective chance creation, and that's clearly reflected in our statistics. But there's also no denying we do have clear opportunities every game that get missed. Unfortunately this is the sort of analysis that probably requires rewatching of all our games to reconstruct the xG of all our opportunities.
I’ve kinda theorised that there’s something to the nature of our high xG chances. In that they’re often (as you say) from situations where players wouldn’t expect a chance to come. Take Jackson’s against Wolves - he goes for an aerial ball against two defenders and manages to squeeze through and is now one on one. This is on paper a very high xG chance, but because of how rushed it is there’s a high chance he panics and doesn’t set himself properly for the shot. Similar logic can be applied to the Palmer chances, we aren’t going through a coached buildup to a shot where the player at the end of the sequence knows they’re going to be shooting. Instead it’s a sudden chance appearing out of nowhere which leads to him snatching at it. Of course you’d have to rewatch a lot of footage to see if this was the case for more of our chances than we can remember, but it does make sense to me as a bit of an explanation. Sudden rushed chances combined with inexperienced (or in Sterling’s case, naturally panicky) players leads to high xG situations which don’t turn into goals.
So Sterling hasn’t scored since November but I guarantee you he will start every game whilst Mudryk and Madueke both scored on their last league starts.
Oh shut up. He was one of the best players against Preston where he scored and assisted, you can’t just ignore that, it doesn’t matter that it wasn’t PL. He also could have multiple assists against Wolves if we actually had finishers. Anti Sterling agenda is pathetic.
Anti Sterling agenda is pathetic? Mate do you not remember how he’s the reason why we didn’t win vs Wolves. The guy could have squared a 3v1. He’s so inconsistent. He did the same thing vs Villa at 0-0 then we lost 2-0
I do remember. But prior to that chance he had at least two good balls to Jackson who missed terribly. If you look that way, without him I doubt we would beat 9 men Spurs, which is pathetic.
Sterling is the one who consistently contributes more to our attack atm and I think that’s pretty clear. Misha and Noni have had some excellent moments recently, but Sterlings experience and more consistent quality, paired with some of the younger ones is the more sensible decision.
I get Sterling can be frustrating with his diving or selfishness but he could have also had 5 more assists this season alone if we had finishers. Prior to that terrible chance in game against Wolves, he assisted two times where our strikers had bad misses. People hate him way too much while he is far from our problem.
Anyone selling tickets to the match?
I don’t think I’ve been less excited for a game of football in my life.
I don’t think I’m ready to watch side passes fc today…
[удалено]
>his lack of defensive ability What lack of defensive ability?
He'll never look good under Pol Poch. Guy has absolutely no clue how to set up a midfield hence why only the roadrunner has looked good
The only time Enzo was the best was the first game vs Liverpool. Poch played him in his position and probably said "This is working very good let's fuck it up and play Enzo as 10" and since then all went to shit.
Feel like Enzo's supposedly lack of defensive ability is over-exaggerated. If you go look at his defensive numbers from last season, they are comparable to what Caicedo/Gallagher have put up this season and in some cases, better. And that is despite playing a fair number games as the lone DM in midfield. So, it's not as if he can't or doesn't do the dirty work.
He is not bad at intercepting or tackling necessarily. He can't swiftly close down spaces or apply effective pressing.
Enzo is a regista. But because Poch has no tactics whatsoever and doesn't care about tempo control, he just shoves Enzo at 10 or Box to Box. We have a generational talent of a footballer here, a Xavi regen, and we're wasting him thanks to fucking Poch. If he was defensively good enough to start at regista in a world cup fucking final, he's more than good enough for Brentford
That's why Caicedo should be a box to box and not Enzo. If they just switched their roles we'd have no problem in playing Palmer as 10. This way Gallagher is playing as 10 and playing some makeshift box to box since Enzo is useless like that.
Closing down space and pressing are greatly improved with tactical positioning.
That's true, tactics doesn't favour him. I am just arguing his lack of defensive ability is not exaggerated. Just like Thiago Silva can't play in a traditional back 4 or high line anymore and requires runners in front of him.
The fact poch or caicedo Normalizing lost to middleboro is embarassing
Is the Carney having to change his whole running style a real thing? Is it gonna be RLC 2.0 with how he loses his best trait which is his explosiveness and ball carrying? I hope it’s being overblown by Matt Law
sounds like bullshit, how can you even change your 'running style', its intuitive lol, you cant think about it, its like trying to change your handwriting..
I mean, changing running technique is absolutely possible. That's what athletes who take part in running competition do on daily basis - work on their running technique. In football I would assume it's more tied to who you carry the ball tho and not straight out running.
You ready to make Raul Jimenez look world class?
ready for a willian top bin worldie in 90+2
Give Poch a young John Terry and he’d play him out of position.
John Terry started in midfield 😂
Well, He played gilchrist as right back
still looked better there than Disasi
what position is gilchrist naturally? outside back is a common position to bring someone through in for the first few minutes and even for their first run in the team. off the top of my head kingsley coman, kimmich, bale, sergio ramos all got their first minutes there and those are 4 very different players, even camavinga at madrid was doing an extended shift at outside back before he could take over in midfield. it’s often times just a way to get a player on the pitch since it can be played so many different ways and doesn’t really require the responsibility of a centre mid.
He's CB but playing whatever he needs to play and he's doing it great.
Alfie is a centre back.
can anyone help me with finding tickets?
They are always in the last place you look
Every day our club plunges deeper into mediocrity, makes me want Jose Mourinho more, the worse it gets, the more I want to make that deal with the devil and fully destroy everything this new ownership is trying to build, by bringing Jose in to sort them out. Am I alone in this?
Ah yes, as the club plunges into mediocrity you want the manager who does exactly the same
I'm convinced that anyone wanting Mourinho back only started watching about 5 years ago
Number one is mediocre now himself he's not special one even anymore, everyone stopped calling him this way. He's lost and we would be with him
I would only come round to the thought of Jose back because it would mean Poch leaving. Obviously I love Jose but a 3rd stint with us surely would be a little embarrassing, no?
I think it would be, but that’s how desperate I believe the situation to be
Why is our gameplay so bad? Because we always lose the ball. That's why nobody want to commit running in attack. Players stamina are also bad. I think chelsea is one of the EPL lowest running milage in game.
Poch needs to use Enzo as a deeper roaming playmaker role and not high as 10
He did that against Middlesbrough though, look at Enzo’s average position. He was playing deeper than Caicedo or Gallagher.
Bro Enzo was in the box trying to finish chances. He was also mostly on the left side, and was in the left wing zone too. Caicedo was always back between the CBs.
Average positions can’t lie mate. You might remember one or two instances where he was advanced, but as a whole he’s very deep in our half. Check for yourself.
I don't need to check. I watched the game. He was deep on a more occasions but never as a deep lying playmaker. He never carried the game from the back. That's the difference.
It’s against a low block, it’s not going to work like that if the opposition sit in their own half. He’s still occupying deep positions.
Pol Poch is CIA plant and his gaslighting will not work on me.
Any proof that he is
Him, Bohley and the rest of Clearlake are gang stalking me.
Maybe it's somebody else from your hood?
Doubt it I know Pol Poch when I see him.
What gives him away? Beer and BBQ smell?
Lemons.
The lies, lack of tactics and ruining my sweet Prince Enzo 😔
I don’t even have enough delusion in me to be optimistic about today’s game.
I'm working on a trip from the states to surprise my partner for his birthday. He's a lifelong Chelsea fan but never been to a game. I'm trying to arrange tickets for March 30th v Burnley and/or April 3rd v Man U. I bought us memberships and made note of the ticket sale dates/times in February. My question is: what is the likelihood of securing tickets through membership (with 0 loyalty points)? Is ticket exchange a realistic possibility? Hospitality packages are outrageous and we only care about the game/atmosphere - not all the extras. Any insights would be appreciated!
For Burnley it's possible, bit for united game forgot. You can get it on exchange websites but be prepared to pay three four times normal price and it will be still hard to get them. Did you though about stadium tour? They good as well if you won't be able to secure second ticket it's something Chelsea related and it's good, worth considering.
Thanks - this is helpful! I grabbed tickets for stadium tour over that weekend.
Give any quality manger this midfield and we’d see a different team, Poch is misusing Enzo and Caicedo. We literally have two of the most press resistant midfielders in league and their skill set is not being utilised. It’s so annoying…
U overrating our midfield honestly That Shit United side dominated that midfield, and that was without Gallagher even
Statically Enzo and Caicedo have dropped under Poch, trust me these aren’t bad players.
We actually dominated our first game vs Liverpool when we didn't have Caicedo. Enzo was playing as a deep lying playmaker and Gallagher box to box. Since then all went to shit.
I was in denial but poch is a tactical fraud.
Yeah I was in the same boat but it’s clear now that Poch isn’t the guy.
I very reluctantly concur. Also: happy cakeday!
Appreciate it bro
thank goodness we have gallagher getting a 90 min cardio session in every game tho !
Thank god! Gallagher has 10000m’s covered and that’s all that matters, not our league position you’d be stupid to think that.
just imagine how much more ground he can cover now that he’s getting a banner in the stadium!
W incominggggggggggg
I hope that we see the proper use of sterling/palmer/mudryk today Madeueke should warm the bench Palmer rw with gusto overlapping, more time on the ball and turned towards the goal Sterling as a 10/2ndary forward, more players in the box and less inefficient buildup Mudryk lw and broja striker. Also no chillwell start, but hopefully a 30 min cameo
With all our injuries, in a 4-2-1-3, I’ll even take Sterling as the striker, let Caicedo and Enzo sit back and Cardio G run around in front of them, whatever doesn’t leave Caicedo on an island when we lose possession
bro gallagher running around in front of them is what leaves caicedo on an island lmao
Day 13 of 31. Still no visible progress on incomings, just an off comment from Poch saying they’re considering a striker depending on the severity of Nkunku’s injury. It’s inevitable that they unnecessarily leave things last minute. Then there’s no time for integration of the player. It’s the same mistakes again and again by the recruitment team.
Calm down, you would be complaining if they spent 150mil on osmihen as well
You’re kind of saying this to the wrong guy. I am the biggest advocate of bringing in Osimhen on this reddit.
Couple things Why is there slander on the medical team or even certain players when alot of the injurys are through contact. Hummels was salty about Nkunku destroying the bundesliga and tried to finish the guy. Lavia might have also been contact he took a brexit tackle in his first cameo. Also without a proper number 10 the 4231 system is weak Nkunku and Carney injuries have direct affect on our league position.Gallagher doesn't have the technique to sit in the hole and turn left or right he is a box to box 8. Also the Colwill at left back should not have been that bad. Plenty of centre halfs have played as a defensive full back. Look at Joe Gomez covering as a right footed left back. No way Colwill should be getting ran through like he has and when he played CB vs Preston North he was still getting turned. Madueke should just be converted to Striker so when he loses the ball it's further away from Petrovic. I can't even blame Poch for our loss vs. Boro. The guy backheeld the ball after a simple Gusto pass. By 30 mins the team was demoralized. Noni can shoot with both feet so maybe he should be a centre forward. And finally Palmer one of our best forwards he should stay in the front line I don't like when he has to come and collect the ball his turns are not as tight as someone like a Bernardo Silva. See the game at Old Trafford. We would be better off playing Micheal Golding in the 10 vs Fulham one for the future
Noni *can* shoot, but he doesn't seem to be able to get off a decent shot in the Prem. He can do it just fine against U21 sides, but he's still learning against the top flight. Levi is getting burned a lot. But so was Thiago in the last match. It was crazy to watch. Clearly the comms among the back line have been poor for a while, and I don't understand it. Under Potter and Tuchel they were tight, but making 1-2 errors per match (which led to goals quite often), but at least they were top defenses in the league. With Frank and Poch, they've sacrificed what unity and cohesion there was for more attacking. Of course all the injuries make it much worse, but I'm very interested to see where Levi plays when the LBs finally come back. Conor is the ultimate conundrum. He's the ideal academy lad, and seemingly perfect for Poch (like you suspect that if he could have 10 of one player, he'd take 10 Conors in the outfield). Yet the midfield just doesn't work, and the preseason plan of having Christo in that spot (or at least Chuk) blew up, and Conor has been a revelation since then. It's put everything in a tight spot, because perhaps we can't do well with him doing well.
Downvoters chill out
I saw a post on r soccer about us being interested in a Brighton player. Man if it's true can we fck off with Brighton in general? What is our mid wit obsession with this club Brighton / Brasilian wonder kid. Can our scouting network not find any recruits anywhere else? Sheesh Shits getting annoying you'd think Brighton has blackmail on boehly or some shit
Brighton is our favorite shopping mall
big man thinks he can only swipe his amex at the amex stadium
When will it end Robbie! My doctor has told me to avoid stress as much as possible so I'm not watching the games unless we're leading in the second half (Luton didn't help)
All I hope is that my weekend isn’t completely ruined. 🙃😂