Matches, Premier League - Written by BlueChampion on Sunday, September 21, 2008 19:35 | 1,607 Views | 112 Comments | Add Comment
Chelsea 1-1 Man Utd | Joe Cole & Anelka save the Reds!
Question: How do you beat Chelsea at Stamford bridge? Answer: You don’t. (Courtesy: ESPN)
Man Utd started strongly. And then for about 75 minutes, only one team played football. The ‘champions’ were raided, ragged and ridiculed. Only a terrible Anelka and a poor Joe Cole prevented a total annihilation of Man Reds. We out-thought, outplayed, out-passed and out-shot Man Utd so much that it feels like a win. We weren’t sharp in taking our chances but there’s no denial that we created chances at will whereas Man Utd could only wait for some occasional counterattacks and some lucky loose balls. If you’re Manure fan that happen to read this, you’re never going to agree, but do I care?
Chelsea dominated the match. We had 25 shots to Man Utd’s 15. We had 61% possession against the defending champions. Man Utd were forced to sit back and defend, not for 10 or 15 minutes, for about 75 minutes. In this process, they wasted time whenever possible, they played ugly, collected about 7 cards and always a tackle away from a red card. It is certainly a moral victory for Chelsea that we made the defending champions look so bad. We could have done a lot of good if we had started briskly. We were sluggish at the start and that’s what Man Utd exploited and took the lead.
Chelsea had to lose Deco as late as in the warm-up before the game. That meant a surprise start to not-fully-fit Ballack and also some strategic changes in the game plan. Otherwise, our starting line-up was the same as the one that played in the last match. Felipe says that we needed some time to settle down with this sudden change and Man Utd made the best use of that time.
For me, the best players of the match were Mikel and Lampard. The man of the match has to be Mikel. He was simply outstanding. he absolutely bossed his area. He won possession with considerable ease and also retained it with some style. He could never be hurried on the ball and even in this high tempo match, he seemed to have lots of time on the ball. Though he started in the defensive midfield, as the game progressed and the situation changed, he cleverly played various roles and covered a lot of ground. Towards the last half hour, he also advanced to the final third and looked much more dangerous. He had a major part in the equaliser too. His free kick was just perfect. It was a very well paced and weighted delivery which should end in a goal without doubt. Mikel should start in every single match and in case of need, can also be used as ‘holding attacking midfielder’. Now, how does that sound?
Lampard serves us another 8/10 performance. He is always known for his robotic consistency of his high standard game. He seems to be better his own records. Today, he was again, just too good. His passes were not put to good use by our forwards. But he was brilliant. Ballack, Deco or Kaka - you put anyone with him, he will just go on. He has been raising his game to beat his competition. that’s what he did with Ballack’s arrival and now with Deco. Lampard is still Lampard. Trust him, he delivers. Every single match.
I thought Ballack may not be fit to play for more than 45 minutes but he played on for 70 minutes. There were no signs of him being not fully fit. There were no half measures from the German captain. He made some intelligent passes, forced some saves and he was in action all the time. For a few matches in succession, Malouda was not bad. He was quite good, quite good to the extent that I wasn’t too happy that he was subbed off.
Bosingwa and Ashley Cole were at their best, in defending. In attack, they were very well marked and hence hardly had the space to deliver good crosses. Bosginwa was slightly at fault for their goal. He did not try enough to keep Evra in check, or he made a bad decision. Despite that, he gave a very good performance. Ashley Cole is like Lampard in the sense that he too keeps giving these 8/10 performances week in week out. Ronaldo didn’t even try to cross path with Ashley Cole. Unfortunately for him, even his countryman Bosingwa was as good as Ashley Cole today.
Two mediocre performers tonight - Cech and Terry. Cech was at fault for the goal. It wasn’t the most difficult shot to hold. It was hit straight at him and that was not even unexpected. Instead of catching it, he let the ball slip which was then easily netted by Park. That was an error by Cech. And that was quite costly. Also there was this poor clearance from him which was almost lobbed to goal by Rooney. Other than that, he hardly had a role to play in the match. In other words, whenever he had to play a role, he didn’t fully impress.
John Terry was not his usual self. He was indecisive, error-prone and in fact an accident waiting to happen. I even feared that he was going to make a silly but expensive blunder that could put the game almost out of our reach to win. In Carvalho’s absence, Terry’s lack of focus looked very disastrous. Credit to Alex. He played like he plays in the Chelsea first team every week. He was very strong in his strides and tackles. He won almost every header that he went for. He wasn’t afraid to throw himself for the interceptions and blocks. Top class stuff from Alex.
The biggest culprits of the day were Anelka and Joe Cole. Smart finishing from both of them would have got us atleast three goals. Joe Cole missed two one-on-one situations, both of which should have been goals. Even Carvalho would have finished them coolly. As for Anelka, all that he had to do was to raise his leg by few inches with somewhat decent timing. I picture myself there at the end of the low cross, could I have finished it? May be yes! Both of them put a lot of pressure on the team by losing possession in key areas. While Joe Cole unnecessarily complicated his ball retention, Anelka was simply too lazy or unresponsive.
Let me say it - Anelka is not Chelsea material. He neither has the quality nor the spirit to play with the likes of Lampard, Ballack, Drogba etc. He does not show his commitment at all. Only in the last 10 minutes or so, I saw Anelka ‘attempting’ to play with some fire. Still he was not good enough and I have my doubts if he would ever become better what he is now. Felipe seems to have some faith in him. If a player like Anelka does not get fired up after Man Utd takes the lead in Stamford Bridge, I have nothing to say. Anelka’s mind is not here, it’s not in the game. Even a Franco di Santo would have done a better job. Kalou was brought on and he made a difference, he caused some trouble for the opponents. Anelka should be told the truth.
When Drogba came on, it was such a relief. Granted, Drogba didn’t do magic today but his presence on the pitch gave me so much strength which is the case I guess would be with the other Chelsea players too. He held the ball well and at times, you could see that he is not fully fit but as long as he’s there, he puts that extra bit of pressure on the defenders.
And can we bring the fear of losing his place for Joe Cole? He can play as poorly as he can and he can start the next match too. This goes on in a loop. In the matches among the big four, you’re not going to get too many chances. If you get one, you need to make the most of it. Joe Cole got many today and made a mess of every single one of them. At one point, it was so frustrating to watch him lose the ball trying to make some silly tip of the toe trick. The game is not about him. It’s about Chelsea having to score three points. I now understand JM’s annoyance with Joe Cole. Like JM, Felipe should say ‘one more match like that, he’s out of my team’. He’s played quite a few like that so he should be on the bench already.
My player rating card could look like this: Cech - 6, Terry - 5, Bosingwa - 7, Ashley Cole - 8, Alex - 8, Mikel - 9, Lampard - 8, Ballack - 7, Malouda - 6, Joe Cole - 4, Anelka - 4, Drogba - 6, Kalou - 7, Carvalho - 6. I’ll tell you what these numbers mean. By BBC’s definition: 10 is pure perfection, 9 is outstanding, 8 is very good, 7 is good, 6 is average, 5 is off colour, 4 is poor, 3 is woeful, 2 is embarrassingly bad and 1 means ‘give up the game.’ Now you can link it up!
Our defence and midfield were rock solid. Did Berbatov play today? Or was Park subbed after his goal? Did we ever break a sweat to dispossess Ronaldo? What was Rooney’s contribution, wouldn’t they have been better off him? Wasn’t Hargreaves repeatedly nullified by Ashley Cole? They must be thankful that this was not a humiliation in the end. Riley gave them 7 yellow cards, deservedly so.
But he showed his very famous Man Utd affiliation on the pitch. Malouda was brought down by van der Sar. For me, that was a clear penalty. And for all the delays, fouls, cards, time wastings etc, the stoppage time was only 3 minutes and when we got the free kick at the edge of the box, there was still half a minute. With half a minute remaining, would a referee blow the final whistle at that stage of the game? Strange.
The home league record continues. Look, I’m very happy and proud about this record but if we were to lose at home, I’ll feel more sad that we’ve lost points than for the loss of a record. Already an unbeaten run for four seasons in a stadium is an unbelievable record and there’s is no shame if it has to end this season. This draw today means we don’t top the table anymore. It is Arsenal now but it’s not a surprise.
Arsenal got to play all the possible relegation battlers such as West Brom, Bolton, Fulham and Newcastle while we had to play Man Utd, Tottenham, Portsmouth and Man City. Arsenal have got their toughest fixtures in October and November. So, by Christmas we should see some sense in the table. Even otherwise, I won’t be worried until they get a lead of more than 11 points. Until then, we know they can collapse and crumble to finish as runner-ups, oops, third lowly place I mean!
112 Comments
1. xerxesk
2. andrew
ballack played well…but he is not in mtch fitness…..
3. Spyder
To be frank we were CRAP. Mikel was amazing and Alex was good(only two players who impressed me) and we need to get anelka out asap. We could have won the game had we played well. Also their new defender Evans has got talent. I just hope that Scolari’s got some brains and starts Kalou instead of Anelka and I don’t want us to loose a talented player. We need to give Sinclair and Paim some chances too, instead of depending on the same team week in and week out. Joe Cole(except for the cross to Anelka) and Malouda were mediocre and I would prefer Joe Cole to hit the bench for some time because he becomes rusty if he’s started too often. I prefer giving Di Santo a chance and some encouragement instead of Anelka. He’s an Argentine prodigy and he could be our Aguero !!. Thinking about Anelka’s howler makes me sick, he missed the lovely cross from Joe Cole and the best part - he wasn’t marked and still he just stands there and misses. Never seen such a lousy striker and if any of you noticed he was at the wrong places at wrong time. Manure’s lineup was second rated. They didn’t have Tevez and Vidic. SAF had some guts to play Evans.I doubt we could have scored in Vidic’s presence. Anyways I think its time that Scolari wakes up from his slumber and gives some games to Kalou, Sinclair, Di Santo, Ivanovic and Bridge, before we start to loose them. We have used our full backs for too long and they need to rest, as I don’t want to see them injured.
Player Ratings :
Cech - 6.5
Ashley Cole - 7.5
Bosingwa - 7.5
Terry - 6.5
Alex - 7
Mikel - 8.5 (My MOTM)
Ballack - 7
Lampard - 7
Malouda - 6.5
Joe Cole - 6.5
Anelka - 5
Drogba - 6.5
Kalou - 7(nice dribbling)
Our team needs to improve. I think Arse are on top of the table and also we need to be wary of Liverpool because they could beat Manure and we couldn’t.
4. CFCIR
what is happening to terry,with this performance he will loose armband of england.
lampard,malouda,jcole played very bad. j cole could score atleast one of those chances.
5. ravi
Bad game for chelsea . even though we got a point of this. we lost carvalho for probably months. Not sure on deco, but we are defensively covered.
5 games into the season, 2 draws and both the draws at home. we have seen in the last four years, the team that wins most of home games wins the EPL . Chelsea won 18/19 , 2006 season.. It is getting tough because we face Villa 2 weeks from now, who are playing very well and we have a bad record against Villa..
Overall very disappointed with Chelsea and Anelka and Joe in particular . They had a couple of chances which would have given 3 points.
The thing that I like about Fergie is that his team was not predictive at all. Never though Flecther would have started ahead of anderson, nani , giggs . to counter bosingwava and ashley, it was good move to start with park and owen hargareves.. Scholari team was predictable and was the same that played for three games running , pretty much similar to Grant ..
Injuries bring opportunities and let see if he plays sinclair, paim or franco in the portmouth game.
elsewhere , man city is on the rise - 4 -0 and still going . May be we missed on Robinho. worst come worst , Shaun Wright Philips already scored third goal for Man city..
6. CJ - 16yrs Blues Fan
Quoting CJ - 16yrs Blues Fan @
BTW Robinho and SWP have scored and its 5 -0 .
But Pompey is playing like Division 2 team…. awful defending…. they should just sit in the box and guard their goal as obviously they cannot even play for a draw……. oh and it is 6-0 now…. shocking…..
7. BuildChelsea
In Carvalho’s absence Terry’s faults were put on full display……and how could Anelka miss that golden chance is beyond me……J.Cole , well i don’t have any words to explain his poor finishing….disappointing after creating so many chances….
8. CFCIR
arsenal usually dont lose point in these days and we have to wait a long time to get back on top.
we drop 4 points at stamford bridge this year.
9. bcfan
This home record thing is now forcing us to play in such a way that we defend the record. because of that we keep dropping points..
just one win out of three at home for chelsea and arsenal has won all the three..
good result for man u. they have already travelled to anfield and bridge this season and have people recovering from injury..
10. cancorus
mikel for me ran the show, was chelsea’s best today and showed what has that many people have not seen - the magic, alex was superb as well takin everythin in the air. Pls if we can i think we shuld return anelka to bolton, thank God dd is back atleast things can only get better now. I also loved kalou especially his jubilation
11. mcurto
Mikel was alright but the kid needs a few games to gain confidence.He seldom tries to make forward passes to assist strikers.Alex was super and if Terry wasnt captain he would be benched to make room for Alex and Carvalho, best thing out of this match was the confirmation of Alex value.Kalou was good too and he showed he could even replace Deco as a creative miedfielder in case of need.Ballack clearly was out of form and if it wasnt for Deco warm-up injury he would be benched.
Anyway,there were just too many wrong passes and crosses as usual, MU goal started from a stupid pass (from Ballack or was it Frank Lampard?cant see it in replays) in the middle,Scolari need to address that ASAP.
12. bcforever
John Obi Mikel played very well. LFS, seems to have run out of ideas.. Man U suprised chelsea by having Ronaldo and Tevez on the bench and I rate Tevez better than Rooney or berbatov.. but the real suprise was the way they countered our full backs..
This is where Mourinho was different than anyone. He used to make changes which takes other managers by suprise. LFS now and Grant earlier seems to play with 4-3-3 and not even changing the players. u can win a match or two , but not a season..
another thing is that we have backup players at all poisitions except for deco ( playmaker) or winger( he did try for robinho ) and that seems to be causing problems.. arsenal on top of the league and looks more promising to me as they had three players out to injury and they are expecting eduardo and rosisky in the end of the year , which will help them push further. this was missing last year.
as for chelsea, we need to sign a striker for sure or play kalou and di santos more often to see how they perform. anelka is not fit to play in big 4 games, but we need for squad rotation , carling cup , fa cup games and home games against bottom 5 teams..
lastly, I agree, with Vidic, we may have not been able to score the goal today.. It is not yet the time to have drastic changes, but caution ..
13. Jo
lol…just a draw and we are hearing so many doubts abt chelsea ability…c’mon guys..i am disappointed with a draw too…chelsea should have won as we played better than man u…anelka dreadful miss and joe cole’s poor finishing…we were unlucky to lose deco in the pre match warm up..esp when we played him for all games and suddenly lose him for a crucial match…worse still we lost carvalho…however we recovered well and almost won the game…and who says if vidic was there we will lose???????????y dun u guys say if essien carvalho deco were playing we will win….the fact is tt we played better than man u and tts a compliment….though we still gotta improve…
14. Jo
and to those tt say we miss swp and robinho tts absurd rubbish…swp is scoring and performing as well as robinho but its already shown tt swp cant seem to do tt in chelsea…and MANCITY STILL LOST TO CHELSEA 3-1….so stop complaining about this…..have more confidence in chelsea….our problem nw is just finishing and i believe today’s dreadful finishing will only make us more aware and stronger
15. Jo
nw both park ji sung and ferguson are toking crap by saying they dominated the game ….chelsea clearly dominated most part of the game…
16. Blues_Godson
here is the statistic of the March….its obvious we outplayed them in every aspect of the game and its just unlucky that we had to stomach Anelka again as he ruined us…..
Chelsea Manure
SHOTS..(ON GOAL) 25(7) 18(4)
Fouls 18 22
Corner Kicks 7 4
Offsides 1 1
Time of Possession 60% 40%
Yellow Cards 1 7
Red Cards 0 0
Saves 3 5
17. MoiBlue,
WTF…. total crap anelka…. why dont some one tell felipe that there is no place for crap players like anelka…. bullshit, even i would have scored at the opportunity presented by joey to this crap
18. cancorus
@43 not sure about not helpin the strikers (mikel), I think he does what he can, given his role as holding midfield
19. bcforever
hey guys - net net what happened is we drew 2 out of three games at home. next up is villa, with whom we have bad history at homes ( draws for 2 seasons) and worst history away ( losses ).
can’t believe lfs allowing anelka to play entire match and worst come worst, he seems to be talking of parterning with didier . I would assume, kaluo to be given more chances..
yes facts looks good , but remember man u have played 2 big four team already away from home and in the epl, it is just the points that matter.
20. ravi
Scolari Confirms Mineiro Recruitment
http://www.goal.com/en-US/Articolo.aspx?ContenutoId=875196
This is really bad news for Ivanoic .. Can’t believe, he hasn’t played one professional game for the blues , since the last 9 months .. this is torture.
I hope he starts with Alex in the Carling Cup.
21. needJOSE
we need more in depth in our squad, otherwise Chelsea would easily predictable…
22. bluefan #1
whats wrong with this anelka guy. he should be playing tennis or somtehing. he catn fvckin put the damn ball in the fvckin goal. and why isnt kalou getting more chanses. now that drogba is back let anelka cry i bit on the bench cause he sucks. for me a.cole was the man of the match. i belive the whole line upp wasnt good. the starting 11 was weak today. and j.cole should put his chanses in the goal to. i was fvckin worried that we was going to loose
23. olu
[Mikel was brilliant. He should not be seen as a stop gap for essien, the guy is earning his place in the team. As usual, Lampard did not show up when he was to be counted. Don't get me wrong, I like him plenty and I am a Chelsea fan today, because of him, but when the chips are down like today, he is unable to carry himself not to talk of the team. I dnt think Deco would have made a difference as this is real 'english footie', I suspect he may have even gotten a card or two. Leave Terry alone pls, the man is okay, He is better than Alex at least and we dnt have 2 Carvalhos. I wonder why cech had to spill the ball into park's path.
Of course Anelka is Crap, Malouda is crappier, and I hope scolari now recognises that Kalou has to start ahead of him. The problem with Chelsea's game since Scolari came acquired a full head today; we never hit the gound running. We wait for the opposition to bring their game, then we respond.QED
24. yomo
Quoting yomo @
whats wrong with this anelka guy. he should be playing tennis or somtehing. he catn fvckin put the damn ball in the fvckin goal. and why isnt kalou getting more chanses. now that drogba is back let anelka cry i bit on the bench cause he sucks. for me a.cole was the man of the match. i belive the whole line upp wasnt good. the starting 11 was weak today. and j.cole should put his chanses in the goal to. i was fvckin worried that we was going to loose
25. yomo
Quoting yomo @
Quoting yomo @
whats wrong with this anelka guy. he should be playing tennis or somtehing. he catn fvckin put the damn ball in the fvckin goal. and why isnt kalou getting more chanses. now that drogba is back let anelka cry i bit on the bench cause he sucks. for me a.cole was the man of the match. i belive the whole line upp wasnt good. the starting 11 was weak today. and j.cole should put his chanses in the goal to. i was fvckin worried that we was going to loose
26. moyo
My man of the match is between mikel and bosingwa. Terry was absolutely terrible and anelka played nonsense. I can’t believe no one has complained of joe cole yet. He played the worst football on the ptich. Two one on one chances and he couldn’t even hit the target…. he could only sky the ball…. This match was annoying.
27. cancorus
fair point moyo, j. cole was really awful today we certainly need to buy more forwards and wingers as joe and malouda are not near being good enough for the game we want to play
28. yomo
Anelka and florent malouda should not be placed on the start up of any match that chelsea want to succssfully
win over their opponent,because there just keep spoiling the attack.I would prefer drogba,j.cole and kalou to play
the attack,then deco,lampard, and mikel(main man)should play the midfield for effective control of the
midfield.John terry,carvalho,a.cole,bosingwa for the defence.It would be lovely if chelsea operate in a four-thjree-three formation.Anyway Scolari fellipe is doing a great work.Scolari you are great.
29. CFCIR
SCOLARI MUST BENCH ANELKA/MALOUDA/BALLACK FOR NEXT GAMES AND PLAY KALOU/DROGBA/MIKEL.
I HOPE ARSENAL LOSE POINTS IN THEIR NEXT GAMES . ANELKA AND MALOUDA WERE TOTALY CRAP.
30. CFCIR
why arsenal next games are too easy. with this arsenal form we should wait months to get back on top.
31. CFCIR
we drop 2 points against spurs at home and spurs are bottom of the table. cech made a bad mistake in park goal.
he could catch the ball easily.
32. johnarejr
I was at church and missed the broadcast here in the states. A draw against Man U ain’t the worst result in the world. Losing Riccy and Deco is kind of bad though. But, Alex can hold his own. Ballack is back and as long as Mikel keeps progressing, so what. Joe and Lamps have been known to have a bad game every now and then. So, I ain’t ready to throw a brick at them. I wish Drogs were 100% and that Kalou would play more often. Maybe he should start instead of Anelka. Praying For The Quadruple!
33. Arun CFC
Hi Guy’s
Stop Complaining….., Only because of Anelka’s and joe cole’s missed chance we drew today’s match.We controlled the game after 20 min’s,MIKEL and Alex were superb.
We should admire the fighting sprit of chelsea player’s, Arsenal and liverpool are only GOOD when it is their day,but chelsea can come up with pionts even when we r not playing well(remember match with WIGAN ).Yes Arsenal are flying now but three weeks before arsenal was defeated by fulham(plz listen @CFCIR ,@ bcforever ,@ bcfan) also liverpol was not able to beat stoke city.Again Title will be decided between Chelsea and Manu ,we r having six points lead (ManU one game less).
Scolari has done a good job as chelsea manager now we r scoring more goal’s also our style of football has changed(more attacking), now BigPhil should rotate the squad(Dump Anelka), bring ivanovic,sinclair, Di Santo into first team.
Come On CHELSEA !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
34. Chaka
I have always said J.Cole is an inconsistent player.He cant beat his man on a one on one.His leg over looks like a poor man’s version of Robinho.He should be reduced to the bench.As for Anelka and Malouda,they are both craps.Have said it several times here that Phil’s idea of trying to mold this chaps is not the best.They too should be reduced to the bench.Kalou is more dangerous and creative in attack than any of the above three.He can beat is man and run at two or three defenders.It about time Phil start using Santo too.That guy might be a diamond in he ruff.Mikel[MOTM],Alex,A.Cole and Boswinger were our best players today.
35. CFCIR
i dont like to see anelka play anymore . scolari must play kalou instead of anelka. today wasnt chelsea day.
players like drogba/rooney/adebayor should score j.cole chances.why deco and carvalho injured.
scolari is right,chelsea can not hold possition and this is why man ut scored a easy goal.
by the way someone attack united bus during exiting stamford bridge.
36. Elliot
Your analysis of Anelka is spot on. He may be a decent player, but he just doesn’t seem to have the spatial awareness and anticipation that the other players have. He needs to be benched immediately and then traded in January.
I do think your criticism of Bosingwa was too far. I think he played very well. He consistently shows himself to be one of the top right backs in the game…and he absolutely punked Ronaldo. He doesn’t deserve anywhere near the criticism that Anelka/Cech/Terry got.
37. SRG
Anelka Sucks and something is wrong with Cech. Cech caused us the premiership last season but because of his past performances we ( chelsea fans) let it slide. But something must be done , we need a good keeper that will give him a tough competition, bring him back to his best. I dont think cudicini will give him that competition. Anelka Sucks. Chelsea needs one more striker if they need to win premiership, he is simply not good enough. We cant rely on him. Lampard shouldnt be taking corner kicks, why does he always hangs the ball in the air he should be whipping those balls across the goals. Belletti / Deco or even mikel should be taking corner kicks. The only time Mikel took responsibility of taking free kicks (vs Man u)we scored. Lampard is not a good free kick taker simple.
38. churchill
this is terrible how bad is the carvalho injury? anelka should only play FA and Carling cups for now on. hes B squad material, as his atrocious finishing shows. we need to play kalou more often, he cant be worse than anelka
39. bcforever
@Arun CFC - you are spot on , liverpool and arsenal lose matches , when they are not playing well. But situation as of now is we have dropped points twice in 3 games .. If you look last season, we won 13 games away and 12 games at home. My feeling is that we drew 7 games at home , for the fear of losing that impressive home record.
Teams that have won EPL , win more matches at home. Man U won 17 games last season..
40. henry
Joe Cole missed two clear chances, were he had to just beat the keeper . Anelka missed one glorious chance and one half chance , were he had to just redirect the ball.
After the CL final, Anelka said he was not given enough time to warm up etc. Looks like even 93 minutes is too less for our le-sulk to warm up . Why was sheva not given so much starts and chances. ?? Perhalfs he was unlucky to play when we had a fit drogba .. BTW, the press is not question why Keanne is scoring goals after 8 games ( 20 million move). Sheva did score in his first game .
LFS says he is going to play anelka and drogba together. I agree with others that he should play Kaluo and drogba together. Anelka can play carling cup, fa and some reserve team games to keep his fitness ..
Come January, we need a striker with a physical presence, if we have to win EPL. At the moment, Arsenal is in a prime position playing their best and clearly having the momentum.
41. cancorus
amazing how much we say mikel played very well and should be man of the match, on motd, they said mikel was poor just abit surprising to me. Don’t wat anyone thinks
42. mcurto
I dont fully agree.He keeps the ball well, you dont see him conceding too many balls, but in a way thats because he doesnt take any chances: how many long passes or crosses you saw from him?1?2? You wont easily see him making assists…I know hes playing a defensive midfielder role but Essien does that same role and once and while he tries to surprise the opposition with some forward runs or even long shots, and sometimes it pays off.Would like to see Mikel doing some off that, maybe he needs a few games to get more confidence.
43. Den
Mikel went forward on ocasions in the 2nd half and was great, this kid is star and will keep getting better
44. Spyder
Now there’s news that we will be signing Minerio(ok its better to have ssome cover before we loose him to another team but …), wtf !! We have got Ivanovic and belletti, and they are capable of playing in the midfield, yes they are defensive minded but i feel they need to get chances. We also have some youth from the academy and they need to play so as to prove themselves.
As we noticed yesterday SAF played a 20 yr old defender against us (although he had O’shea and Brown) that shows his faith in him. I start to respect him, whom did he play ??? - Flecther,Evans and Park that too against US, man he had some balls to do that. We can see the way Wenger operates. I feel that they are the managers in a different category and they stand out, this doesn’t mean I undermine Scholari. What I don’t like about him, is, he’s not rotating players. See what has happened to Deco, he got injured during training and are full-backs are no different(I feel their injury is a short while from now). Ashley and Bosingwa run like crazy, they attack and they defend and due to the huge distance they cover they need to be rested for some time. We played the same team in three matches in a span of 8 days !!! I feel we have to rotate Deco, Lamps and Ballack (that is amongst themselves) so that they get to play and are also rested, because these guys are 30+ and they are more injury prone.
I don’t understand what’s wrong with us, lets give some chance to the youngsters like Kakuta, Mancienne, Sinclair, Paim, Stoch, Di Santo, Bruma, Nouble, Hutchinson, Cork, Woods, Tejera, etc so that they can shine and if they are not up to the mark then we can play Minerio/anyone. The players like Bojan, Pato, Sulejmani, Muratori, Marcelo, Higuain, Diego Capel, Mata, Gago, Drenthe, Giovani, Hamsik, Pjanic, Marin, etc(this list can go on and on) did not become stars in a day but were played as subs and then stepped in as regulars. If we need to buy players then why have a youth system ????
45. Blues_Godson
i cant wait for the transfer window to open again…..we need a playmaker urgently because i am tired of seeing joe cole and malouda mess things up….they should be shipped out of the team…..together with ANELKA…
Terry was our worst player. Kalou said he wants to be a chelsea legend, he now is. We missed Deco with his vision for passes. The best thing is they got 7 yellow cards!
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