FC Copenhagen vs Chelsea | 22-Feb-11 @ 19:45 UK
The manager, the captain, the team, the fans – we are all in the same page. We must win the champions league. Well, if we are winning something this season, it’s only gotta be the ‘big ears’, because we are no longer in any other tournament.
If you’re a regular reader, you’d know that I prefer to draw the biggies in earlier stages rather than later for two reasons. One is, you can eliminate a key rival for the title who you anyway might have to play at some stage; two is, the confidence that it gives you to move ahead to win the trophy is immense. This time around, I didn’t want us to draw the biggies. When the draw was made, we were right in the middle of the disastrous form this season. I was hugely relieved that we’re playing FC Copenhagen. That’s no disrespect to FC Copenhagen but certainly they are no match to Chelsea, on paper.
In the new landscape here at Chelsea FC, you can’t take anyone lightly. Certainly not FC Copenhagen. I don’t what the odds are, they could be close to even. If I were a punter, I’d surely put some money on FC Copenhagen to upset Chelsea. We know that it’s not so much of an upset as we seem to fearing this game while they are all set to rock our already wrecked boat.
We have a near-full squad to choose from – as it’s been in the recent couple of months. We also have Fernando Torres available. True to his style, Carlo has already announced that Fernando would start. Torres should find playing away at Copenhagen lot better than playing in England. Playing in Copenhagen would be less pressure, for him, at this stage. As far as team selection goes, we know who gets picked and who’d play. So apart from the news that Torres would play, there’s nothing much I want to add.
Make no mistake, the opponents are waiting for us. They’re longing to play this game and knock us off. Solbakker, the FC copenhagen coach says this:
Since 10 January, we have been preparing for this game and this game only. Maybe we haven’t had the opposition we’ve needed to be at our best level, but the players are in good shape and confident. Some of my players are so daft that they think they’re a better side than Chelsea. Maybe I should be talking them down a bit. Some have only lost one or two games playing in this side, so they think it’s easy. Confidence is very high in the team.
FC Copenhagen players thinking that they’re a better side than Chelsea? How the mighty have fallen!
Carlo on the other hand, takes solace from his trackrecord and believes that his history would repeat.
A lot of times, I’ve been able to manage this moment. I want to remind you in 2007 it was the same situation and the Italian journalists know this. The Champions League is the most important competition. We’re involved this season more compared with the other competitions. To be under pressure, this means to be focused and try to do our best in this competition, to try to win.
He also said, in a very firm manner:
Chelsea won’t go out against Copenhagen.
I’ve trusted him so long, I’ll give him one last chance.
As a fan, I say you are right, as a person who is watching soccer for years, I say we have no chance.
We need a miracle, more than a miracle. If we find our form, we will have chance but I do not think so….
but Again as a fan, I am very optimistic ….
Gattuso gets a four-match ban for what he did to Spurs assistant coach Jordan. In my view, Gattuso was trying to kill him. Jordan could have choked right there, we don’t know about Jordan’s medical history. And he gets a four-match ban. Drogba protested against the referee and the stinking UEFA establishment after a robbery of a match, and he got a six match ban. Well done UEFA!
BlueChampion,
Good point ….
UEFA is corrupted, my friend …. I do not know when Soccer will get rid of that french frog …
I do not approve what Gattuso did, but do you think Tottenham COACH has right to talk with opponent’s players … I think Tottenham coach should have been banned as well ….
But bottom line, UEFA is corrupted my friend ….
Sepp Blatter ruined World Cup [last world cup I watched was 2002 and Korea Vs Italy was the last game I watched] French Frog is doing the same to CL ….
After 4 months of tortue…watching a team give up their defense of the Premier League without a fight, facing an uphill battle to grab the vital 4th spot in the league and then losing entry to next years CL…having a homeground advantage which had opposing teams expecting to lose big time, to now where everyone even thinks they can win….losing to Everton in the FA ,who even their own coach conceded was bad and heading into
relegation dog fight soon…we’re all wondering what will be the next wobble….interesting Terry is backing Carlo even though the club is in it’s worst period for 15 years…which for me reinforced a feeling that the coach is too close to the players so when tough decisions need to be made he wimps out which means players can be out of form and hopelessly for months and there are no consequences…well one, you keep your spot and keep playing bad…I think we all agreee successful coaches choose players on form not reputations…hope the Danes did not watch the Everton match as they saw our one dimensional style…and then can follow the Everton blue print in blocking it.
if they like (fc Copenhagen) let them start preparations from last December,Chelseafc will always come out on top of them.I expect Torres to get his first hat-trick for Chelsea today.never say never,Chelsea for life.
So now Pat Nevin is also sticking the knife in on BBC. How these guys call themselves Chelsea Legends i’ll never know. They are all cowards those lots. I find that these so called Legends, are the first to propagate these myths abt the Club when things are not going well. U never hear a Manure past player speak the club down even when they r not playing well. Yet ours always do this , whether to appear credible in the eyes of their journalist peers i’ll never know. Pat Nevin even writes articles abt the team on it’s official websites and now he says Drogba and Torres can’t play together. Hypocrite.He was the first man clamoring for a striker when our bad “moment” began. I am disappointed in this so called Legend. Fernando Torres has only played 2 games for the Club. Give the guy a break. and it’s not as if no defender nor manager know who he is. I’ve seen Jason Cundy , Scott Minto and the likes work for ChelseaTV. Yet when they appear on talkSports and Sky all they do is talk the club down. It’s sad. We are going through more than a sticky patch but we surely dont need our own “Legends” running us down. Shameful!
To be honest , i fear we may be kicked out against Copenhagen. We lack confidence ,big time. Carlo knows this , yet doesn’t seem to know what to do to address this. Sad. Anybody at all can mange the Blues when they r playing well. Carlo it’s times like these u need to show ur mettle. I am afraid u’ve failed so far. However all can change tonight. Come on Chelsea!!! If the Copenhagen lads believe they can beat us then we have got a huge fight on our hands.
Right then… We shall get onto the match for now…
We ve relied enuf on Mikel, Essien & lampard..
What worse can happen if we play youngsters?!?!
——————–cech——————————-
Bose——Bane———EBALJT———Cole(Sub:Bertrand)
——————–Josh—————————–
—-Ram———Anelka————Zhirkov———
————Drog(Sub: Kalou)–Torres———-
What do you say???
We will win this game and boost our morale. Keep The Faith!!!
MatBlue,
Just 1 thing to say to those so called Legends-wtf.. – Fuck off!
It will sound to bad Chelsea fc losses todays match… I feel unhappy when we map out our time to watch an important match, inventually we went home shamelly… Blues 4 ever…
Does anybody know why Mourinoh watched Chelsea game against Fulham ?
Go for him ..
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-1359409/Real-Madrid-boss-Jose-Mourinho-hints-Chelsea-return.html
Line up for today game [which Lotti will not use]
———————— Cech ————————–
Bosingwa—–Terry————–Ivanovich—-Ashly
————————Essien—————————–
————-Lampard————Ramires——————-
—————Kalou————Anelka———————-
————————–Torres———————————
Kalou and Anelka are not winger, they should play CF behind Striker ….
if you want to use Malouda , use him behind striker ….
Crunch time guys, now’s the time to show what we’re really made of. We only have tonight and the return game to turn this season around. I hope Ancelotti and all our players take FCK seriously. Any complacency or arrogance will be punished. Terry have been out yesterday and today in a call to wake the team up and get everyone to show some responsibility.
FCK players we have to be especially aware of is N’Doye (a very dangerous and unpredictable forward), Grønkjær (we all know what he can do to a defence on a good day), Martin Vingaard (free kick specialist). The rest of FCK I don’t really know much about.
If the hype is anything to go by then Copenhagen is ready to send us back to London point-less. So expect a difficult game, BUT if we have sorted ourselves out then we can win this game and leave Denmark to deal with their winter depression.
Ståle Solbakken on FCF official web site
http://www.fck.dk/index.php?pageid=754&newsid=11130
We’re playing a 4-4-2 with DD on the bench. Very surprising as we do not usually have great success with a 4-4-2.
Little curiosity. Brian Laudrup ( 42 yrs today) scored his only goal for Chelsea vs Copenhagen. A goal that eliminated FCK from the competition.
Interesting that todays matches feature two managers who need to win the CL to save their seasons. Carlo, of course. And the sainted Jose, who is unlikely to win La Liga and is out of the Copa.
A good day for Chelsea. A tidy win, an away goal. And Spurs lose. Just about perfect.
This will stop the moaning and groaning about Carlo for a day or two. Despite the criticism he gets for being tactically inflexible, he unveiled a 4-4-2 today. First time this season? It worked well. Lampard drifted into the hole and created a lot of chances in the box, beautiful short passes of the like we haven’t seen much of this season.
Anelka, Torres and, later, Drogba worked well together as a duo. This was a great game to see the difference between an in-form striker and one who’s not. Anelka converted two chances. But Torres just couldn’t find the right touch. He’s getting in the right positions and you have to believe that once he finds the net they goals will start to come more easily for him.
I wonder if the 4-4-2 is something that might work in the EPL? Or was it successful because Copenhagen’s formation allowed it to be?
I think it’s clear to us all now that Anelka is our first choice striker. Torres is improving and DD needs to work harder and change his attitude.
It was a very easy away win tonight against a team that have just come out of hibernation.
Good to see the 4-4-2 formation work so well, especially the way it brought Lampard back into a decisive role again.
Essien and Ramires rules the midfield like Emperor and King.
Lots of positives to take away from this game.
I think 4-4-2 would work in the league. Oddly, I think it can function as a better attacking formation than the 4-4-3, as Lampard has more space to operate in the middle of the pitch and the system allows for out-and-out wide midfield players, which stretches a defense a bit. We did seem to get caught up the pitch at times, however, allowing Copenhagen the space to break. Better teams might capitalize on that.
I’d like to see Carlo use Bosingwa as a right winger in the midfield. He’s got pace, a touch of trickery and is better suited to bombing down the flank than defending. He’d give us some width out there on the right and I’d feel confident that that side of the pitch would be well defended with Ivanovic positioned behind him. Unfortunately, that means we’d probably have to drop either Essien or Ramires to allow for a role for Bosingwa. But that might not be a bad thing. Essien’s look tired at times this season and Ramires is ill-suited to combat the more physical/border-line thuggish teams in the league. Could be a way of keeping the squad fresh.
Dana, is that really you?
This is so positive! :)
Moaning and groaning? That’s the least he can expect after scaring us with loss of a champions league spot. For the records, we need to do quite a lot than a champions league win against FC Copenhagen to call this fan’s dissatisfaction ‘moaning and groaning’. This is still no redemption for Carlo yet.
Positive when due and negative when due. I hope to stay positive for the remainder of the season.