Disappointment. Now that’s a goal difference of 3 in as many matches in the US of A. I’m not sure what objectives Jose had for these friendlies. May be, he wanted everyone get some match practice, gain some sharpness and come out without any injuries. If so, Jose would be happy, but I’m not.

We played flat 4-4-2, with Cech (Cudicini 45), Ferreira (Mikel Obi 45), Carvalho, Terry (c), Ben-Haim (J Cole 45), Wright-Phillips (Shevchenko 45), Essien, Lampard (Sidwell 73), Malouda (Johnson 73), Drogba (Hutchinson 88) and Kalou (Makelele 60).

I was watching the match live. At about the 15th minute, my internet connection went off and never came back for the next three hours! You have to see these things just like you look at injuries. They just happen.

Anybody who had seen the whole match live, might have a different opinion than mine. May be, we played brilliantly but were unfortunate to end at just 1-0. While I’m happy for John Terry scorig 2 goals in 3 matches, from the team morale perspective, it would have been lot better if Sheva had scored these instead of Terry.

terry_galaxy.JPG

The whole thing of ‘world series of soccer’ thing is a big joke or at least the nomenclature of it. For the records, we did not win this trophy as we were only 5 goals short of what was required.

It’s kind of obvious that the orthodox 4-4-2 works for us better than the diamond which impacts our width and can be a real failure if the tip of the diamond is a waste of space. 4-4-2 with wide midfielders was very refreshing to see, with our various attacking options.

Sometimes, if a formation does not work for you at all and then you move to a better formation, suddenly you’ll feel like you’re playing with an extra man. Like they say in Chess, a blocked bishop is no bishop. If this orthodox 4-4-2 means that Ballack won’t be able to play too many matches, so be it. We all know that he is a class player and when his place is threatened he should come all guns blazing, when given a chance.

[video]http://www.dailymotion.com/swf/KCkqp1M50ffAlih3f[/video]

I don’t want to talk about Beckham as you’re probably going to be bored, with the amount of Beckham-mania in the Press. I’m happy we don’t have to play LA Galaxy any more. I pity those teams that play against LA Galaxy, David Beckham himself, LA Galaxy themselves and the football fans in America for the obscene amount of Beckham-news they might have to read.

To sum up what we’ve seen in the tour of America, we have seen almost all players in our squad in action; Hutchinson and Cork are pretty decent; Joe Cole is the man to watch this season; we don’t seem to need a certain 30m right back; we’ve officially ditched 4-4-2 diamond; Terry is back and it shows; Malouda won’t take a season to get accustomed to the Chelsea system; Drogba continues from where he left last season; we still retain the habit of winning.

Finally, Chelseablog has got a face-lift. Go see it. It’s nice!

[tags]Chelsea, LA Galaxy, Jose Mourinho, John Terry, David Beckham, Beckham, World Series of Soccer, goal video[/tags]