Newcastle v Chelsea 18/01 live on Sky 5:30pm

This topic contains 20 replies, has 8 voices, and was last updated by aindro aindro 4 years, 2 months ago.

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  • #1817221

    nine nine nine
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    Just to stop Aindro starting the thread which gives us half a chance!😊

    It’s a game we should win but Newcastle have been a bit of a bogey team of ours lately especially at St James Park.

    I suspect Newcastle will play like the away team and try and hit us on the break.

    Kante back?

    #1817263
    aindro
    aindro
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    hahaha. It’s an away match, so I don’t expect it to be easy. Agreed, Newcastle will defend deep and counter us. They have Joelinton who can hold the ball but cannot finish but they have Almiron who scores lately. My worry is especially their GK, unbeatable on his days. I would predict a draw 0-0

    #1817358
    chelsea1967
    chelsea1967
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    1-0 – Mount. Up at 4.30am for this one. Worst possible time.

    #1817376

    nine nine nine
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    The dilemma for Frank today is who does he play in midfield with Kante available again and after two positive displays from Barkley as the rest of the team virtually picks itself given whose available.

    Assuming Frank decides to go 4/3/2/1/ 4/3/3 again which is his preferred formations someone has to play the pivot role in front of the back 4 and that is likely to be either Kovacic or more likely Jorginho I suspect Frank will probably select Kante on the right of the 3 and Mount on the left of the midfield 3 given that Frank has started him in 20 of the 22 PL games which would be tough on Barkley but Frank admitted last weekend that he took a risk playing such an attacking midfield at home to Burnley and I think he will be a bit more conservative for an away trip to Newcastle.

    We’ll know at 4:30pm today whichever side is picked let’s hope it’s good enough to get an away win at Newcastle.

    #1817377

    nine nine nine
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    67, few of us appreciate the levels of commitment our Aussie fans have to show to follow Chelsea.

    #1817481
    aindro
    aindro
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    Interesting lineup where Christensen is again preferred to any other CB to partner Rudiger. I reckon if we can get a clean sheet there, Reece James will nail the RB spot. Jorginho is preferred to Kovacic, which I found strange as Kovacic brings the ball forward that will be useful for this kind of match. CHO starts again too. I still think Newcastle sit deep and will make our life difficult to unlock their defense. We need every bit of our creativity and also luck there.

    On the other hand, Spurs and Arsenal did not win. And very probably Man Utd will lose tomorrow. So if we win tonight, we can make the distance higher with the teams below us.

    #1817511
    aindro
    aindro
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    1-0 Newcastle. Last minute. We did not play bad but it was not enough. When our 2 of 3 shots on goal came from Kante, it should tell something. For me there’s no confidence to shoot or even to cross the ball. We had to try. Newcastle’s goal, St-Maximin just tried to whip it into the penalty box and that’s it. We did not really try that, we were waiting too much for the perfect opportunity, perfect moment. Anyway this kind of lost is just very hard to take. We completely dominated the game, they scored from their 1st corner.

    Only Kante tried to shoot. Willian did but it seems that he lost confidence later on after he missed that golden chance. And seriously Kepa should have done better with the goal. He is really hesitant everytime there’s a cross. So yeah we did not win today and we failed to distance ourselves from the teams below us. Next 4 matches will be very difficult, we have to expect for the worst

    #1817520

    nine nine nine
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    The story of our season really totally dominate but can’t create any clear cut chances and then can’t defend the cross again.

    No creativity little to no threat up front and really poor ability to when defending the high ball we need a dominant centre back, some more creativity and a better offensive alternative to Tammy.

    I think it’s really touch and go whether we ultimately make the CL if we can’t bring some quality into the areas we need it in January which currently looks really difficult.

    #1817525

    nine nine nine
    Moderator
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    Frank sounded really frustrated in his post match interview and committed to doing something about it in January.

    It’s such a tough month to bring in the players you really want but I have the feeling that if Chelsea don’t manage to 4th place will slip away.

    #1817538
    bort
    bort
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    I would do horrible things to have Eidur Gudjohnsen in this team

    #1817541
    aindro
    aindro
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    I have another theory. Maybe it’s not creativity that we are missing. We had 10 corners compared to Newcastle 1. We dominated the match. And yet they scored as an indirect result of that only corner.

    I think we are missing shots from distance. At least Kante tried to shoot. But nobody else. We are missing good header from set-pieces. 10 corners resulted in no goal. We are missing good direct free kicks. We had 2, Mount was pretty good but the 2nd one Mount and James tried a combination that did not work at all. In the past those were our sources of goals. Drogba, Terry, Ivanovic headers, Lamps free-kicks and shots from outside the box. We don’t have these qualities in this current team. We just need to develop them. We need to be able to score from half chances. I think Jorginho had some good position to shoot but he did not do it.

    #1817558
    chelsea1967
    chelsea1967
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    Will be interesting to see if Abraham goes all the way moving forward and does become the striker we hope for. Again in this match, at times he looked gangly and uncoordinated.

    I think for these young guys this season has been a big step up and they are struggling a bit now however the experience will be invaluable as we move into next season and beyond. Players like Timori, Mount, Abraham, James and Hudson-Odoi have been fast tracked and, to an extent, over exposed but it is all good for the future. A few strategic additions and we’ll be fine.

    We do though need a quality leader out there. JT has never been replaced, or even close to it, in that respect. A natural born leader is an essential component that we are missing. Especially defensively organising our defence. Our keeper still has a lot to learn too.

    #1817571

    Gibblue
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    Been a while since I posted – yesterday was yet another frustrating day not least watching Franks press conference. It was clear to me he knows we will struggle to make top 4 without reinforcements which he seemed resigned to not getting. Our club will not overspend to get players to us in a difficult market in January and Frank’s comments that “we cant practice finishing any more than we do” tells me he knows he is reaching the ceiling of the players current abilities and that new blood is essential.
    Letting goals in as we do towards the end of matches shows we are perhaps not just physically weak but also mentally which we can understand from young players. Perhaps this is where Frank needs to learn that in the last 10 minutes if we still havent won it he needs to make changes to make sure we dont lose it!
    When a team dont want to attack us even when they are playing at home then why dont we play 2 up front and make sure we are also set up not to get hit on the counter. Giroud may not score but will create space and chaos in defence that would then help our other attacking forwards. We have in Giroud someone excellent with his head and a brilliant crosser of the ball in James -play them together for once!!
    Another spoiled weekend 🙁

    #1817581
    NIBlue
    NIBlue
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    Last week Frank did not make a substitution because in his words “He was enjoying watching the team play too much”

    We brushed aside Burnley a potential banana skin, with relative ease.

    Yesterday Frank made a change and well as they say the rest is history.

    I have said it before and I will continue to say it. Love Kante to pieces, but he is NOT the best in the role he plays at the minute.

    Yes he was taking shots yesterday, which is great but that is because he lacks the creativity that other attacking midfielders have, He is great with the ball at his feet and will run at players, which is fine and dandy when you are playing against the footballing sides like Liverpool, City, Arsenal but when you are playing against teams that park the bus or take a more physical approach he is not as effective.

    He lacks the killer pass in the attacking half, he lacks the physicality at times both when attacking and when defending from the front, which in turn leaves us more exposed for the counterattack.

    He is the modern day Makelele. His strengths lie when he is tucked in in front on the back 3 or 4 where his agility allows him to nip in and steal the ball off attackers, breaking up attacking moves be they a slow build up or a quick counter attack. Then he plays those simple balls that enable the attacking moves to start.

    Kocavic, Barkley, Jourghino, RLC (when fit) all are more suited to the role that Kante plays, they have all the attributes he lacks in the attacking sense and not one of them are fit to lace Kantes boots in the defensive sense.

    I wish Frank would go a run of games giving Kante back his old role …. (when I would be confident we would have a run of clean sheets) if only to prove be wrong then I will shut up and eat humble pie if needed!!

    As for Kepa 🙈🙈🙈🙈 work in progress I would say … Pete get you suit off and get down to the training pitch to help him out!!

    #1817854
    Blueowner
    Blueowner
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    This squad should still be good enough to beat all these lower league teams we lost too, it’s unacceptable there’s no reason I can think off why we losing regularly to these sides. At least a draw against these teams would have given us 7 extra points and in a comfortable top 4 position. Now we have to do it the hard way. I can’t really pin point the reasons as it’s cracks all over the field from the keeper to upfront. Thankfully other teams near to us also dropping points but one can’t count on that for too long. Realistically we have to look at a top 6 position which means no CL and a financial killer.

    #1817923
    chelsea1967
    chelsea1967
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    ha ha Blueowner agree. Funny that exactly the same thing happened toward the tailend of last season when Arsenal, United and Tottenham gifted us 3rd when we easily could and possibly should have missed the four altogether.

    #1817927
    chelsea1967
    chelsea1967
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    Good to see you guys posting here again. Thinking that RLC is a big miss in an attacking sense. Struggling to come up with a quality spine which all the top teams have. Cech, Terry, Lampard and Drogba. Kepa, Rudiger, Kante (attacking midfielder), Abraham. Chalk and Cheese really.

    #1817934
    NIBlue
    NIBlue
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    Blueowner agree with all you are saying. The way I see it Kepa is not worth the money. He does not command the box and makes too many dodgy decisions, however it is not helped by an ever changing back 4 who in turn do not aoppear to have total confidence in the keeper.

    Jorghino is not a defensive midfielder, he is more creative on the attacking side. Kocavic when he plays again is not defensive but is more likely to put a foot in and is a physical player, however regularly we are seeing either of these two playing in a deeper role. Barkley in form is a handfull going forward and has a bit of vision.

    I refer to my last post re Kante, creative attacking midfielder he is not, which then starves the supply to the attacking 3. Too me playing Kante out of position weakens the midfield both in attack & defensive.

    My real concern is Frank like Sarri before does seems to favour playing Kante out of position so What happens if Roman does make a marquee signing, a creative attacking player. He will not drop Kante, more likely to be Mount or Jorghino and we will be no better off!!

    #1818024
    aindro
    aindro
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    Great to see posters start to be active again. Welcome back guys. While I agree that we should have been more comfortable in the league had we beaten lesser teams: I still think we have overachieved so far. Back in the summer before the season started: I personnally did not think FL could bring Chelsea into top 4 in January. Others except Liverpool dropped points to our advantage luckily, but that won’t last for sure. We will face a succession of high profile matches these next 4 matches. And these matches IMO would determine where we would finish at the end of the season. I am hoping FL could get at least 2 wins from our next 4 matches, but let’s see. We really need to be clinical in front of goal, we really need to shoot when we can

    #1818100

    alanp
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    I think we should appreciate that we have exceeded expectations this season, I really hope we can get top four, but will not blame Lampard too much if we do not. This team is in its infancy and at the moment has an obvious problem breaking down well populated and deep defences – Newcastle lined up 5-4-1 on Saturday and defended deep so that there was no space to run into, not easy to solve! Give it time and I think we will have a very, very good side, especially with a couple of sensible signings. Don’t just look at the youngsters who are in the team, recognise also that Gallagher, Gilmore, Ampadu and Loftus-Cheek could be quality players for Chelsea in the future.

    The future is bright, the future is blue.

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