Archive for the ‘soccer’ Tag
Chelsea have today signed Marko Marin from Werder Bremen in a fee what is believed to be £8 million. What do I say about that you may ask?? A BRILLIANT BUY!!
Him, alongside Juan Mata on either side of the wing would be instrumental to say the least, especially on paper! The guy is a true wizard, and he reminds me of a German Lionel Messi in a way! I think he could be an exceptional addition, and expect to see either Florent Malouda or Salomon Kalou get sent their marching orders too!
Welcome to Chelsea, Marko!!
With every game we win, I’m really starting to trust Roberto Di Matteo’s philosophy because judging from the results we’re getting under his leadership, albeit an interim one, it’s giving us all the confidence we need to turn our season around, and hopefully end the season, either with a Champions League place, or even winning the Champions League.
And our great form under Di Matteo continued today with a very well-deserved 4-2 away win over Aston Villa. Considering that this was only our 2nd win at Villa Park in 12 meetings, I’d say this was a key win today.. and Arsenal lost 2-1 away to QPR, so it’s smiles all round for us blues. If Swansea can defeat Spurs tomorrow, then that would just be the icing on the cake!
Daniel Sturridge got us off the mark with a tap in on 9 minutes, and then it stayed 1-0 until Branislav Ivanovic popped up to nod in our second goal. Villa fought back however through goals by James Collins and Eric Lichaj to make it level at 2-2, and suddenly, all hope looked bleak.. another game at Villa park without a win was looming… until Ivanovic smashed in our third, and then Fernando Torres, after 6 months without a league goal, ended his drought with a last minute strike.
Speaking of Torres, I think he deserves all the recent plaudits given to him by the Chelsea fans. It wasn’t very long ago that he was playing second fiddle to Didier Drogba because he was on the decline under Andre Villas-Boas, and there were question marks on his future at the club.. now under Roberto, he has found the sparkle in his form, and is now linking up well with Juan Mata and Daniel Sturridge in attack, and it looks like we’re finally seeing the Torres of old.
Another player I want to talk a little briefly about is Mata. When I first saw the team sheet before the game, I said to myself, “oh goodness me, why is he starting again for Chelsea? He NEEDS to rest!” .. but to tell you the truth, Mata certainly plays well for someone who’s played 4 straight matches without being able to rest.. he was one of our star performers until he had to come off for Florent Malouda.. definitely deserved the plaudits, and should have definitely scored a goal for himself.
And just a little more here about David Luiz coming off at half time? What was wrong with him. Some people say that he came off with an injury to his ankle. Well, when he walked off the pitch to be replaced by Gary Cahill, he was walking perfectly fine to me. Maybe it was a slight injury to his ankle, and nothing more than that. I reckon he will be fit for the home leg against Benfica next week.
In conclusion, great win! Especially at a venue where we don’t win very often, and Roberto Di Matteo is certainly getting it right in terms of rotating the squad, and letting players work in the way that they want. It was never like that under AVB.. players emotions and feelings were all over the place back then, and hence the barrage of defeats.. but under RDM, players play because they care about the club, and the turnaround of results in all competitions we’re in really proves that. Can we snatch 4th place from Tottenham… I say YES… we can!
In the middle of March, after the 4-1 win over Napoli in the Champions League, it got me thinking.. is this the crucial stepping stone needed to lift our spirits and get as much confidence as possible to push for 4th place in the Premier League and be once again playing Champions League football?? … Then, a 5-2 defeat of Leicester City in the FA Cup Quarter Finals emerged with Fernando Torres getting 2 goals and 2 assists during the game… and there I was again, thinking and pondering to myself… has Torres finally found his touch of scoring goals again, and is he the one to steer us in the right direction??
Then, along come Manchester City and Tottenham, and in both those games, we’re only able to squeeze out a point, and then, I was like… “oh screw that then”!
There are a few points I’d like to go over in terms of the sheer frustration that was bellowed during the disappointing 0-0 draw at home to Tottenham today. First and foremost, Daniel Sturridge… I don’t know what it is with him, but he has turned from being one of the hottest prospects to come out from a loan spell with Bolton Wanderers, to being one of the most selfish and useless wingers in the Premier League. There’s no problem with the way he gets to the byline and out-runs his opponents for pace, but he has GOT to work on his passing, and just stop going for glory all the time, because it’s beginning to get really tiresome for a Chelsea fan, like myself, to watch something as selfish as shooting from such impossible angles, and hitting nothing but the side netting; or just getting as forward as possible, only to pass it straight to the opposition, and waste all of that effort getting into that space.
Another point I’d like to talk about is the contribution of Jose Bosingwa. Now, before I ramble on about how useless he is generally (most notably going forward), I have to commend his efforts at trying to keep tabs on Gareth Bale during the game. Bale is not an easy player to mark, as he is incredibly quick, and sometimes gets past lightweight players like Bosingwa with absolute ease. But, credit to Bosingwa, he did okay keeping him quiet at times. However, going forward, he is as much use as a brain-dead monkey on a unicycle. The guy just cannot make a good pass… and whenever he does bottle it with that kind of pass, always expect to hear three quarters of the Stamford Bridge faithful groan with agony at an opportunity wasted at the hands of Bosingwa! Put it this way, if a player like Ivanovic was fit, not only would Bale be in his pocket all game, but his determination would have shined through even more in terms of going forward, as we have seen in a lot of recent games. Anyone remember the Extra Time goal against Napoli??
One person I must talk about in great depth, and in a positive way, is Gary Cahill, or “Gazza” as I like to call him.. not to be confused with one England great Paul Gascoigne, but right now, I use the term, Gazza, for our current generation of players… in this case, Cahill. He has barely been at our club 2 months and he’s already won my charms. He has that style of defending that makes me feel as though John Terry cloned himself 7 years ago and that clone hadn’t aged. Seriously, if Cahill had not have been in our back four against Tottenham today, we would have lost 3-0. He’s quick, he gets back, he’s not afraid to go in for a tackle, and he’s stable, just like JT was 7 years ago. I say, if we can keep hold of Cahill for at least 3 years, he will be so important to us! You read it here first!
Last of all, the overall synopsis of the game. The first half was probably the most dull and depressing half I’ve seen this season, particularly when Tottenham looked as though they opted for a dull approach to the game, and, knowing us.. not capitalising on the opposition’s faults. As for the second half… well, I don’t know what Harry Redknapp said to his players at half time, but whatever he said, his side certainly came out of the blocks and immediately took the game to us.. especially in terms of the number of shots that were seen during the game. Tottenham managed around 13 shots, and we were only able to achieve 5. Now if you can consider our overall record against Tottenham at the Bridge over the last 20 years in the top flight, that’s just fucking disgraceful.
In conclusion, a 0-0 draw at home, is not good enough to push “The Turds” and “Lucknal” all the way in terms of fighting for 3rd/4th place in the League. I think we’re completely out of it now. If you look at our run-in compared to the likes of Tottenham, they have an easier time of it than we do, while “Lucknal” just keep winning at the moment, and I just cannot see us chasing them all the way, if all we’re going to do is just keep dropping points at every opportunity. It makes our Champions League campaign even more of a priority, if we’re going to compete in it next season. The thing is, I don’t see us dethroning Barcelona with the kind of form they have this season, but strange things have happened, and in this bygone era, you just never know what football might throw your way!
As every Chelsea fan found out last Sunday morning, Andre Villas-Boas was given his marching orders by Roman Abramovich, and then launched a scathing attack on some of our players, blaming them for the Portugese’s exit! Why? .. Was it because they were underachieving on the pitch week-in-week-out, or was it due to the fact that there was just no trust between the players and the manager?? Well, this is what I’m here to try and get to the bottom of.
When AVB was first appointed as Chelsea manager back in June 2011, there were some high hopes from most fans, not only due to the boasting of his unanamous success in the Portuguese League, and the Europa League with FC Porto, but also because he had worked with the club before, in 2005, under Jose Mourinho’s wing! Villas-Boas back then, had been installed as Mourinho’s left-hand man… a silent, yet intelligent personality, whose job, was to gain as much information on each opponent as possible, and offer it to the Chelsea players in the form of DVDs, which they could watch and study, before putting all of their preparation into practice on the pitch!
The interesting thing, was that it all worked like a charm back then! With the use of Mourinho’s so called, “boring” approach to every league match, Chelsea won the Premier League in 2005, and then again in 2006, becoming the first London-based team to win back-to-back Premiership titles since it’s rearrangement in 1992.
With that said, there was plenty of positives to ponder ahead of AVB’s second spell at the club.. however, there were question marks over his appointment… although AVB had boasted a jaw-dropping season with Porto the previous year, at only 33, the Portuguese was still at a very young age to be managing in one of Europe’s toughest leagues, resulting in many fans to believe he was either overrated or just “too young” to take over! I for one believed in this at first because he was much younger than more experienced tacticians such as former boss, Guus Hiddink, who was also linked with a return to the club. Quite frankly, it was Hiddink I was mostly hoping for.
Instead, Roman Abramovich decided to spend £13.5 million to release AVB from his contract at Porto, and appoint him as Carlo Ancelotti’s successor! And my god did it backfire!! Only 1 win in 7 games in all competitions. I hate to say it with such negativity, but that’s the form of relegation standards!
Now that AVB has gone… it leaves me with something to ponder over the coming months… what now for the club?? Will we really struggle to confirm a top 4 finish and qualify for the Champions League under Roberto Di Matteo? If we don’t qualify for Europe, will some of our players get fed up and leave at the end of the season? What role will Roman Abramovich play in the proposed massive exodus at the club this summer??
The main question I want to know however… is what will happen to long servers like Frank Lampard at the end of the season? The player many fans are led to believe to be one of the firestarters that led to AVB’s demise at the club.. along with Ashley Cole, and suprisingly Michael Essien! But was there really a spat between AVB and Lampard? Or was it just the fuel needed to further encourage news hungry media to spread all over the back pages??
If you ask me.. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was a bit of both! There had been a number of times where AVB had dropped Lampard for games, and fairly important ones I might add…. in his place, comes a former Liverpool employer, Raul Meireles (whom, if I’m honest as I can be, has not impressed me at all). Yes, I understand the idea of giving the younger generation a chance to show the Chelsea fans their true worth. But I watched Chris Kamara on TV a few weeks ago, and he said something rather important about the likes of Lampard and Drogba, “If they know the club inside out; If they are there to be used, just use them!”
At this point, I give you readers who follow Chelsea, a question.. what is the best way forward to get this club back to where they used to be? Keep the old guard, (Lampard, Drogba, Essien, Kalou, Malouda, Bosingwa) and use them as learning mentors to upcoming talent… or, do it Roman’s way: completely rip the whole squad apart and start fresh, with a massive overhaul of new players and staff, and at the same time, giving the younger generation a chance to push their way easily into the setup?
Just remember, the second option needs to be given more of a thought than usual, because if we don’t make the top 4 this season, and we can’t guarantee Champions League football, we might lose our appeal to some of the biggest talents known to exist out there at the moment… most noticeably, a little Belgian wizard we like to call Eden Hazard.
Hello everyone! Finally, after a few rearranging of this and that, I’ve finally managed to get a good decent blogging site that works for me… at last!
As the heading of this site suggests, I have set this blog up, to focus only on my beloved football club, Chelsea, and what their current situation is during each football season that comes and goes. It is designed to contemplate my thoughts, and mine alone, on what decisions are made at the club, and it’ll also include my take on each match the club plays! This blog has started mid-way into the 2011-12 season, but some people have to start somewhere to start a blog, so hopefully, we can take things one step at a time, and see where it takes us!
chrismada9cfc 