When Scolari said that a win is the most important thing for him, I guess he did not refer to matches like these. There are matches that you win 1-0 but still feel comfortable by the fact that you outplayed, outclassed and bossed the opposition thoroughly and it’s just that the scoreline does not reflect that always. The match at the JJB was a forgettable one for Chelsea fans. Bulk of the blame should go to the pitch, whose behaviour we could not figure out. The Latics knew how to play on their pitch while we were still struggling. The only way Chelsea could have scored yesterday was through a set piece. And that’s what happened, in fact, that was the only thing that happened for us.
When Deco was preparing to take that free kick, I was wondering if that was the right move, given that we have Ballack and Lampard on the ranks. Deco is not even a free kick specialist. But the technique and accuracy with which he took the kick was amazing. He had me jump when the ball swerved into the top corner. Last week he was the man of the match and now he scores the only goal of the match. If he is any more consistent, he’s going to carry huge burden of expectations on his shoulders. I’ve already made up my mind to expect 20 goals from him this season, a feat he has never achieved before in his career.
Other than that early moment of delight, there was nothing else in the game for a Chelsea fan. If not anything else, the game was scary. Firstly, the game kind of brought us back down to earth. People like me who predicted a 3-0 rout were made to bite the dust. I have an excuse though. I was told before the match that the pitch is a lot better than before. As we started playing, we realised that the pitch behaved differently in different parts. In some areas, you had to put more pressure to pass the ball and in some it was normal. The amount of unsuccessful passes and lost possessions in the middle were innumerous. At one point, I got so pissed off that I was screaming why can’t you get a 5 passes undisturbed. It was not possible. While I put some blame on the pitch, I can’t spare our players too.
It took less than 10 minutes to realise how horrible the pitch was. Despite realising that our players did not really adjust their game to the quality of the pitch. Our intelligence was not there. We kept trying to do the same things over and over again and lost possession. When the ball does not roll all that well, we may not create width and be successful in wing attacks. More often than not the ball would be intercepted and that’s what happened yesterday. Very quickly, we should have figured out and changed to plan B, if there was one.
When we losing possession, like in every minute, we should have at least retained the ball, pass around harmlessly, feel the ball and the pitch and played within the framework offered by the ground reality (pun intended).
The box defending is still bad. We are clumsy by the day in the box. We’re gonna get punished sooner or later. There were some parts of the match when Wigan and Chelsea played like each other. They were playing in front of their crowds. We also let them have the belief that they can pull one up any moment. That kept them going. In all fairness, they must have scored, at least once. While we had all of two shots on target all match, they created more and deserved more. May be, we underestimated Wigan. It was their home match, they were fighting for every ball, not allowing the Chelsea midfield to settle down and not giving us any time on the ball. That’s how all teams are going to play against us. Every single team would watch the video of yesterday’s match and learn how to stop us.
Before the match I thought I would not see much of Cech while the Wigan keeper would be in action all the time. It turned out to be exactly the opposite. Pollitt was hardly in action. Cech was almost the most seen player despite being on goal. Does his crazy flourescent orange kit draw the opponent players towards him? Cech had his best game for many many months. Last season, he lost his unofficial title of ‘one of the three best goalkeepers in Europe’. In Euro 2008, he dumped himself even further down. But now, he seems to be back for us. This game should mark the return of the Petr Cech we know. My MOTM goes to him for keeping Chelsea in the match and on top of the table.
Loading ...Ah yes, we are topping the table. That’s a nice feeling. Forget about how we won and all that. There were reasonable excuses from our side. I don’t think we need to be worried about the way we played. It was an one-off match. There is only one league match at JJB and that’s over. I think we’ll play more like the way we played against Portsmouth and that would be the trend. This match at the JJB should be an aberration but the important point is that we could hold on to our lead for about 85 minutes in an hostile pitch and a decent opposition. There was no Emile Heskey stoppage time heart breaker this time. In short, the highlights of the match are Deco’s goal, Cech’s performance, Chelsea holding onto the lead and that we topping the table after the match. Don’t let other things bother you. We’ll be back with a bang against the Spurs at the bridge!
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J.cole is sooooo inconsistent it pisses me off!!!!
this is the best for chelsea(4-1-4-1):
——————————————cech———————————————–
bosingwa—————–carvalho—————-terry———————————cole
—————————————–mikel———————————————-
———–essien————-ballack——————deco—————lampard————-
——————————————drogba————————————————
with this star studded midfield we can beat any team, we dont need wingers!!! ( until robinho comes lol)
I was extremely dissapointed today. The fact that our only goal came from a set piece was rather ridiculous, only compounded by our lack of creativity and forward ball movement. Our passing was crap. Solid, smoldering crap. I’ll take the three points, but I’m worried about upcoming games, such as Man U next month. Bosingwa motm hands down but other than that today was shit.
we play shit against shitters, we always do! hopefully that will be changed, but we always bring the goods when we need to, like when we play man united, as least in normal time :S
not that wigan are shit btw! i mean like, non-europe contenders thats all, one’s we’re not jostling with.
ok it was a very very flat game and we played a shit ball against them
but a lot of positives from th match
1. chelsea showed their rivals that apart from sexy football we can also grind out results
which is important to be premierleague champs
see looserpool’s last two games who were the better side who came out with max points?
2.the good ol petr cech was back to his best
he was absolutely brilliant except for that rugby thing
anyone knows when is he goin to remove it?????????
3. the most important of them all
i am sure i can play far better than de ridder
ok he ws playin out of position
that guy was fun to watch
what was steve bruce thinkin when he bought him????????
Three points are three points, top of the league is top of the league, winning ugly is winning. Whining about not making pretty displays on the pitch means maybe you should be watching synchronised swimming or figure skating. Scolari has never been averse to winning ugly. Expect more of it this season. He will do what he has to do to win because that is the most important thing to him. He is not Arsene Wenger choreographing a ballet, rather he is a football manager trying to win the Premier League and the Champions League and more power to him.
@ Unique #46962
No one’s whining here friend. I’m just concerned. Wigan came very close to converting the 3 or 4 opportunities that we gave them as a result of our crap play. It was 80 minutes of crap football and against a team that we should have easily dominated. Perhaps you should focus less on the witty banter and more on the topics at hand.
Deco does curl the ball’s beautiful. Watch him at UEFA videos, its just that at Barcelona he was never given a chance ahead of Ronnie.
I think pitch condition and involvement of players in midweek match has lot to do with this performance…
expect last week performance again against Spurs…
I’ve read so many reports (on other sites) on yesterday’s game but I think what’s everyone missing is that (despite the awful pitch condition), we were out-muscled by an organized Wigan team. Big credit to them. Their closing in and body-to-body hustle was amazing. Even our Ballack was struggling to have more than 2 touches on the ball. My only concern is that we have failed to address this issue since last season when our solid tempo passing was not working, we resulted playing long ball which exposed another Chelsea weakness in winning attacking key headers (and I don’t think Robinho can help in this department….. Santos? Maybe). I really hope Scolari will address this before our next game as I felt that there are more “Wigan-type” of team coming our way. Btw, Cech is the man of the moment!!!!
p.s: I think our Frank is slightly affected by the England boo-boys and I really hope he can bounce back with a hattrick (or a goal vs MU)!!! C’mon FRANK!!!!!
who ever voted they are worried are idiots, our players where very tired coming off internatianals and the pitch didnt help either
i was somewhat disappointed with our performance yesterday but hey, a wins a win, and wer top of the league so its alrite. as long as we bring our a game against the bigger clubs (no disrespect to Wigan, whom i thought played really well today) i think we’ll be in good stead to once again challenge for the title and win it again
hey! you guys are harsh with your comments.have in mind wigan needed results and were playing at home,not to mention chelsea has been highlighted this season as the team to beat so we should not expect any favours.scholari had no option but to play essien and ballack who are not 1oo% fit.Come on you blues,i stand to be corrected
I think Manure got a draw at Wigan last season…they are typical rugby team…so guys don’t worry..Wigan is one of those teams which trouble all of mightier teams and getting all three points here can’t be taken for granted….
@10….’when our solid tempo passing was not working’…sorry to point out,but I don’t remember we were ever solid in passing….we were always capable of doing so but we did it only occasionally,don’t know why….if Scolari can improve us in this department then we will get rid of all most of our ills….
I still think playing all three of Deco,Ballack and Lampard will backfire sooner or later…and our perennial lack of creativity in the box is our biggest weakness to be dealt with…I think Scolari is intelligent enough to see this and will find a solution to it…
No worries as long as its 3 points in d bag.. cheer up guys !! Midweek matches.. pitch.. 1 off day !!! Hope to c-ing the Blues add more misery on Ramos come weekend
I would like to see how Wigan play at Stamford Bridge on a “proper” pitch …………lets see if wigan can play football without the opposition players slipping all around……..it’s no surprise that everyone who play at JJB have a tough time…..the kind of pitch they dish out is only known to their own players….nice tactic..
Our main problem is that the midfield of essien,lampard,deco and ballack is not working at all. No one notice that all four were playing free role. Seeing Deco and ballack at the wrong positions. Mikel is important in chelsea team. The holding role is very important and helps our attacking buildup or any counter attack from the opposition. I was very sad when I found that he’s either injured or just not available as scolari said. We have to win the next two matches againts spurs and united. Before I can be rest assured that we will be on top of the league till december.
@ 5
cech said that he will remove his helmet like in a year or two. lol.
he played amazing though!
Am i worried bout our performance yesterday? No. To be champions one must know how to win even when not playing well.
i think our performance will improve in next game but i think deco lamps ballack shouldnt start together.
Cech has never dropped out of “one of the 3 best keepers in europe” and to be honest he is one of the best keepers in the world not just europe, who out there could challenge him…only Casillias or Buffon and i think Cech is better than both of them and has an advantage in his height. I don’t know where people get this from that he has underperformed recently just becasue of a few mistakes in the last year (i can remember 3 ther may have been more) and for a goalkeeper 3 mistakes is not bad going, his brilliant consistency has been his downfall in this instence as when ever he makes one error it’s unexpected and people doubt him for some reason, do you not think Buffon or Casillias make errors it’s just because you see Cech week in week out and see his mistakes and don’t get to see buffon or casillias make an error. And i must add, wether this made a difference or not…Cech said that after the incedent with Stephen Hunt his eye sight had slowly got worse and he could not judge crosses properly and he only realised this after the Arsenal game (were he made 1 of very few mistakes), he had his eyes tested and fixed and his sight improved. thats what he said anyway.
nobody can play champagne footie all year round…there are always bound to be few matches where u need to dig in and grind out a result and thats what needed to be champions or else end up like Arsnal…..and without doubt Wigan away is one of those matches in EPL…Bolton,Spurs etc few others…so guys don’t worry…
Well, I don’t think Luis didn’t have any plan B. In the second half Chelsea tried even more to simplify the game, playing long passes to Anelka or Kalou, which was clearly aimed to overcome the awful quality of the pitch. But this is a very difficult tactics against Wigan; half of its players could do wrestling instead of football (Heskey, Bramble, Melchiot, Boyce, etc.)
No wonder Anelka had a very difficult time throughout the match; hard as he tried, he had almost no chance in the air and because of the pitch (and a tough opponent) he couldn’t receive a decent pass. Hope it won’t distract him from scoring goals in the games to come
)
we keep only the three points nothing else. It was a bad match only that coming or not robinho we wiil be much better. We have to believe to Scolari…!
to be honest, with all the free kicks drogba wins us around the box, deco could prove to score 20 goals this season, think about it
back to the matter at hand, i wouldn’t worry, its teething problems, we are at the beginnning of the season and are finding form, thats all
I forgot to mention about Anelka. He was found wanting in front of the goal. He seems to lack the instinct of a striker. Whenever he got the ball near the box, shooting does not seem to be the option for him. He lacks confidence to take things on his own. Unless Drogba is back, we are fully dependant on Anelka. I don’t think Scolari would choose Franco/Kalou ahead of Anelka. I would play Kalou as the lone striker and have Anelka on the bench.
we have a big problem called “Anelka in front”
we need to change our option (drogba-anelka)
Drogba is not bad at all but he is in injure all the time .
Anelka place is not in SW6
11. Den is right.How many Wigan players did international friendlys just 3 days before?
Maybe it was an opportunity to field 1 or 2 youngsters there but perhaps Scolari didnt wanna take that chance.
Nevertheless dont take credit away from Wigan they played very well and if they keep up like that they’re gonna end somehwere in first half of the table.
NT Wigan.
i think scolari completely underestimated Wigan, he had 4 defenders at substitution, a goalkeeper, and only a midfielder and only a striker!!! And scolari does seem to lack Plan B, i felt that always, especially after that Germany Vs Portugal game at Euro 08. Playing aggressive is always not a best option and not specially in such tricky grounds. We should have slowed down and played in more ground balls rather than playing lots of airballs. It wouldn´t at all be pleasant at all to play long balls when ground is that slippery, would it? We should have tried to keep more possesion. It was like Chelsea suddenly forgot the basic instincts of playing football. And the most i hated was we were completely out of control. It was Wigan that was dictating the game. If it was not for Cech, we would have gone down 3 goals…..but i hope scolari learns from this mistake, and always comes prepared. There should always be a fail-safe formation, like JM always had. I don´t care how boring we play, but when things are not going as we wanted, i wish we can still control the game and be capable to holding the oppossion in the midfield…thank god it was against Wigan, next time at spurs it may not be the same thing…gotta be careful Phil!
this is a interesting article written by a chelsea fan
“It was interesting to listen to one of Felipe Scholari`s press conferences in which he basically previewed the season.
The only highlight of that conference, from a media perspective, was he saying that 6-7 teams will challenge for the title. But he also said one thing that struck me a lot,
‘Wigan will be a tough team.`
Felipe knew from the outset that we would struggle against a team that combines two styles of football that this Chelsea team bereft of Makelele will struggle against, directness and width. FELIPE KNOWS!!
We did struggle; we were out-muscled and outplayed by Wigan. Both Palacios and Cattermole dominated our celebrated midfield and the whole fantasy about full backs pushing forward was blown apart by a combination of wingers and full backs that cost less than Malouda.
The only reason I am optimistic about this season is because of Scholari and Essien (our best player without any doubts). Sir Alex called our squad aging and there was a reason for that other than mind games.
Frank Lampard is 30, he has at best 2-3 seasons left in him and he is on a £135 – £140k contract for the next 5 seasons. Our most accomplished midfielder is Ballack; he is 31 and after an inspirational 2nd half of the season last year, he is in his final year of contract and is being played out of his natural position to accommodate our awkward looking midfield. Deco has two seasons left in him at best, at £8 million he maybe an astute buy, but stinks of short term thinking.
We are about to spend £28 million on Robinho, a player who has been highly inconsistent at Madrid and there is no guarantee that he will change at Chelsea. BUT FELIPE KNOWS!!
Here is the stark truth; Lampard should have been sold. We should have not let Makelele leave (or maybe looked at finding his replacement, Gareth Barry maybe) and instead of Deco and Robinho, we should have looked at getting a combination of Diego and David Villa, two players who would have added everything to our team that we lack, incisiveness and finesse. Plus both of them are relatively young and far more consistent.
Bosingwa is a good signing, but what are Ferreira and Belletti doing still in our squad; Ivanovic is as good a defender as we will get. Wright Phillips I believe has left us for Everton and Malouda will probably stay, as we need a wide midfielder.
Sheva has left us; best of luck to him. But with Anelka still frugal in front of goal and no guarantees over Drogba, you wonder if we lack a quality selfish striker like Villa. BUT FELIPE KNOWS!!
Arsenal are often accused of over emphasizing long term plans, but you could argue we are the direct opposites. A perfect balance is more important and there in lies Sir Alex`s quiet confidence.
But we still have a world-class midfielder in Essien who should play in an offensive role and not a defensive one like against Wigan; and a defence that will not let us down.
But we also have Scholari, there is something about him. His transfer policy has not convinced me a lot, but his match day know how and tactical awareness has already bowled me over. With him in charge, I think we can do well.”
men!!
honestly I think lampard (too mechanical) should have been sold! Thus because he is still at the heart of the mid field chelsea will still be mechanical in their approach
deco is good but too old thus we should have bought Deigo!!(brazilian) even better than deco plus he is young
SWP must be sold and buy Schweinsteiger!!
keep maloud ( deserves a second chance) the sacking of JM plus the appointment of grant didnt help him
Give Ivanovic a chance the guy is good i know this!!!
sell Belletti
buy mounthino….. super sub
buy David villa/Aguaro—- forward
thus our team set up would be young and exciting :
my perfect midfield:
———————-mikel——————–
———Deigo——Essien———Schweinsteiger————
our best formation:
—————————————–cech——————————————
bosingwa—————carvalho——————-terry————————–cole
————————————–essien——————————————-
—————————-deco—————lampard——————————–
kalou———————————————————————–malouda—–
————————————–drogba———————————————
team against tottenham:
—————————————–cech——————————————
bosingwa—————carvalho——————-terry————————–cole
————————————–essien——————————————-
—————————-deco—————lampard——————————–
cole———————————————————————–malouda—–
————————————–kalou———————————————
Guys our team is just fine as it is. Do you know how many top managers will kill to have our squad? Leave Bel alone. He is a Fine player
@32. MourOfEssien he is surplus man !!
by the way men it seems SWP is on his way to Man city !! for 9 million and
Robhino has been given the go ahead to leave…
you guys have any more information
[...] ctrl+v! or whatever it is for you mac fags Mine: BlueChampions – Wigan 0-1 Chelsea | Three points, table leaders, forget the rest! __________________ HEY WAIT – Read this before you introduce [...]
stop whining guys…our squad is alrite…soon we will have robinho…i think the squad will be finalise…
chelsea always struggles against wigan. I dont expect too many 4-0 thrashings of teams but i expect more 2-0 then 1-0 this season. That said chelsea easily has the strongest defense in the whole epl. Cech is a great keeper and still relatively young for his position at 26(buffon is 30 and casillas is 27), people think he isnt as good a keeper as the other two because he is not as acrobatic but his positioning and 1on1 are probably the best.
Our fullbacks are quality(around mid 20s) and so are our defenders(terry is turning 28 this year, carvalho is getting a little old but from what ive seen alex/ivanovic can fill in that spot).
The only area we have a group of aged individuals is in central mid with lampard, deco and ballack all 30ish. That said all three have never relyed on speed or huge amounts of stamina to play so expect them to be just as good at what they do(passing, controlling play and creating chances) till mid 30s. Our striker contigent is all at peak and only drogba over age and he can play against the big boys for at least another season or two.
Chelsea is the team with the most consistent group of players, our first 11 are good enough to win, but the next 11 are good enough to challenge for top 4. You cannot say that for any other team in the world.