I firmly stand with Clearlake getting rid of Boehly. He's a disaster and is mates with James Corden. Wanker.
Chelsea 2024/25
- Thread starter duffer
- Start date
A truly unforgivable sin.
Not sure if the Board wars will effect the squad short term, but my Chelsea mate is freaking out. But he loves to freak out.
These lot love a PR war.
https://www.theguardian.com/football/article/2024/sep/10/chelsea-in-talks-new-stadium-earls-court
Chelsea in talks over building new stadium at Earl’s Court
- Club understood to have drawn up plans
- Talks held with TfL and real estate developers
wait what? 2033?
Surely the fact no one else has copied Chelsea’s bizarre contract routine is a sign it’s….flawed?
No because the club don't own it. Probably lucky with these clowns.
Any such plans should be voted down unless the cpo will still own the new ground as well.
"Nobody else is doing it so it must be bad" is the kind of thinking that would have us still living in huts and eating nothing but turnips.
Chelsea are pioneers, mavericks, leaders.
Admittedly not basing this on much but Maresca seems like a bit of a prick.
Thoroughly deserved
Very well done against w.ham. Of course early goal helped us and totally crashed W Ham plan if there was one. Jackson used his brain more in 1vs 1 situations and hope he learnt it. Basic was good from us from first game but things getting improved.
Caicedo was MOTM for me. Colwill,tosin partnership looked good . Cucurella form is also encouraging. Madueke need to improve his understanding with team mates. Too selfish but it will come.
Overall we are improving game by game. Maresca so far so good.
Caicedo was MOTM for me. Colwill,tosin partnership looked good . Cucurella form is also encouraging. Madueke need to improve his understanding with team mates. Too selfish but it will come.
Overall we are improving game by game. Maresca so far so good.
Another game again scored 4 goals with four different scorers. Veiga,Neto,nkunku and kdh. Veiga,Neto,kdh scored their first goals for the club.
Renato Veiga kicks ass and I irrationally love him so much already.
Extremely smart business to preempt the FC Basel defender pipeline and buy directly from them. His floor is already that of a tremendous and versatile squad player; if he adds consistent progressive passing to his game (and he had a couple very nice ones against poor opposition last night) then his ceiling gets raised very significantly.
Extremely smart business to preempt the FC Basel defender pipeline and buy directly from them. His floor is already that of a tremendous and versatile squad player; if he adds consistent progressive passing to his game (and he had a couple very nice ones against poor opposition last night) then his ceiling gets raised very significantly.
I liked his profile when we signed him. Tall, strong, fullback/midfielder hybrid with a mean left foot on him. Offers something completely different from Cucurella. I like him very much.
Generally it's been such a positive start to the season. It's funny how all the noise and drama around the club just vanishes when the team is winning games.
Leicester fans told me Maresca was an inflexible rigid manager who was married to his ideology no matter what. He's been the opposite of that.
Leicester fans told me Maresca was an inflexible rigid manager who was married to his ideology no matter what. He's been the opposite of that.
Which I've been genuinely surprised by (not a Leicester fan, but on the basis of what they were saying). He's been extremely pragmatic so far.
He has, and I kinda like it, eventhough we're still conceding too many goals.
We dominated possession vs Palace and got sucker punched by an Eze worldie. Since then, I've noticed he tailors his approach to his opponents much more. We dominated the early parts of the West Ham game, went 2-0 up very quickly then just allowed them to keep meaningless possession while picking them off on the counter. Brighton waltzed into our ground with their uber highline and he took advantage of that too by sitting back and hitting one simple ball over the top over and over again. I suspect we'll dominate the ball more this weekend vs Forest, and lots of people are looking at this game as the first real test vs a proper low block team.
A few tricky fixtures after the international break...
If he never improves from this day forward he's already a colossal bargain at ~£12m - and given that he only turned 21 this past July it goes without saying that he is almost certainly not the finished product.
Not to put too much pressure on him but there are shades of Azpilicueta - low profile back-up fullback signing that were initially squad players but quickly became special due to their versatility and passion.
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What I liked the most is we instantly reacted to missing out on Calafiori with a similar profile and not just that, with his direct replacement at Basle.
Yes extremely smart to basically go one step up in the supply chain and secure a huge discount.
Given the success of Veiga, Samu, and Duran, it feels like our talent recruitment department has been earning their keep.
Really surprised how good they've been this season. Credit to Maresca as I thought he'd be gone by Christmas but I think they're strong contenders for top 4. Really need to replace Sanchez though, he's shite.
We're 3rd but it's hard to feel super excited about it because we're essentially one bad weekend away from being 10th
But we came out of the last international break in 4th with a tough run of games ahead of us. We've come through Liverpool and United away, Newcastle and Arsenal at home in 3rd. Not bad at all. I thought we'd be a few points adrift from top 4, sitting in 7th or 8th but pleasantly surprised.
Maresca has been fantastic generally, but I still feel like we have several gears to go. Positive times.
Maresca deserves huge credit. It's also very odd that he was described as rigid and dogmatic because he's been anything but thus far. He's made adjustments constantly, both during matches and from week to week.
5 points out of 12. Out of the league cup too. Pretty average really. Chelsea do look better this season but the standard is appalling. I mean, the fact that we are only 4 points off 3rd is embarrassing.
I see Sancho can't get in the team. What a surprise
Not sure why the surprise, they have some quality players.
They literally have a A and B team with both having top international players.
No team in the world can have a B team with 100m CM, 60m CAM's, those players which only play lesser competitions and get get into the A team.
Whilst they have played well, they haven't done much, out the league cup, not won against top 6 and only drew to United where teams come in and get easy 3 points
They literally have a A and B team with both having top international players.
No team in the world can have a B team with 100m CM, 60m CAM's, those players which only play lesser competitions and get get into the A team.
Whilst they have played well, they haven't done much, out the league cup, not won against top 6 and only drew to United where teams come in and get easy 3 points
My predictions going into that run was 2 points, so 5 isn't bad really. Average is what I was hoping for out of that run. Out of the cup, that is disappointing but it was a tough game, Newcastle away, but you're right nothing to write home about really.
I think we've had lots teams in the top 6/7 play each other since the last international break, so not much chance to completely separate from the group in the upper half of the second half of the table.
Hes injured
With Villa, Spurs, Newcastle and Brighton looking highly inconsistent you seem locked in for that 4th spot. I expect Arsenal to bounce back and finish 3rd at least. Fair play, I thought freezing out half your players would create a bad atmosphere at the club but Maresca seems to have handled this surprisingly well.We're 3rd but it's hard to feel super excited about it because we're essentially one bad weekend away from being 10th
But we came out of the last international break in 4th with a tough run of games ahead of us. We've come through Liverpool and United away, Newcastle and Arsenal at home in 3rd. Not bad at all. I thought we'd be a few points adrift from top 4, sitting in 7th or 8th but pleasantly surprised.
Maresca has been fantastic generally, but I still feel like we have several gears to go. Positive times.
I still don’t like the whole buying 100s of players and see who sticks approach but you’ve sure gathered a very talented squad. Even playing in Conference League doesn’t seem too bad as you can give more young players playing time. Although that would have been possible in Europa League as well.
Bit hyperbole, but important to clarify, it was just a couple of players, and they've mostly been sold or loaned. Those they couldn't secure moves for were quickly reintegrated into the team and have been played in some matches.
I thought the “100s of players” would give away that the numbers weren’t meant to be read literally. 14 players half of which have already played for the first team (some regularly) might not be half the squad (it would be for City, they have 24 players including academy youngsters) but I is also more than “a couple”. And of course most have been loaned out or sold that was the entire point of the whole exercise, wasn’t it? Just doesn’t seem like a thing that would benefit overall atmosphere and morale at a club, especially with a new and unproven head coach. So that’s why I was surprised the team seems to have gelled quite well.
I don't think it's a massive surprise they are doing well. Poch had them a bit more settled down last couple of months of the season, Maresca has been clever in that he's not changed too much in terms of personnel, so with consistency in personnel is more consistency in performance.
Obviously he's tweaked things to play more his style of football, so they have improved in terms of that. He's been brave to leave out Enzo for Lavia and a few other things so they are a bit more balanced defensively as well.
But they do have some really good players, and their bench is ridiculous. Enzo, Felix, Nkunku, James among others, ridiculous quality. I expect them to finish 4th, I think they can be more consistent than the likes of Villa and Spurs.
Obviously he's tweaked things to play more his style of football, so they have improved in terms of that. He's been brave to leave out Enzo for Lavia and a few other things so they are a bit more balanced defensively as well.
But they do have some really good players, and their bench is ridiculous. Enzo, Felix, Nkunku, James among others, ridiculous quality. I expect them to finish 4th, I think they can be more consistent than the likes of Villa and Spurs.
Problem is all their depth is in midfield. Other than that, their defense has a lot of players but none of really high quality. Some have potential but right now aren't at that world class level. In the striker position, Jackson is good but again not any options otherwise, Nkunku is not a player who can play as a lone striker.
I agree, the defence is young and needs to mature together, especially the 2 centre backs, but I think they should be patient with them and see how they mature because Fofana and Colwell were among the highest rated young centre backs in Europe a couple of years ago.
The goalkeeper for me is the biggest issue as he always has a mistake in him and that can destabilise a defence, especially 1 trying to build a foundation.
Agreed on the goalkeeper. And as much as Chelsea have been clowned for buying so many, the truly elite and proven goalkeepers are rarely available and when they are they go for quite high fees - it's the one position where buying 6 £10m lottery tickets from less prominent leagues makes more sense than buying 1 £60 less risky lottery ticket from a top league (as long as playing time can be assured, of course).
Not usually a fan of snitching but gotta love Cookie here...
I love Cucurella. What a turnaround for him at the club.
The annoying thing about this clip is once Cucurella got the ref to force Havertz to leave the pitch, Timber proceeded to waste a whole minute by pretending he had no idea how to take a proper throw in.