even you can't be that thick? Are all midfielders the same kind of player? No. You should just watch another sport.
Do we think Matic will start Sunday? Got a sneaky feeling with Lamps out that he might. It's not like a completely new signing as he'll know many of the lads from 3 years ago plus central midfielders are rarely used as impact subs like a forward might be. Ramiers Matic Willian Oscar Hazard Torres Lets batter the manc wanc!
OK, to answer your questions, Oscar, Hazard and Willian ARE all young. Oscar and Hazard were NOT superstars when they arrived, but were played regularly by Rafa. Hazard was an instant success, Oscar less so but with constant game time, developed into one of our best. Neither was bought or developed by Jose, though Jose has played Oscar and he has improved no end, which is one of my main points, give the talented kids game time and they will reward you. Willian was a Jose purchase, was not worth 2 bob the first few games, but with game time, he too has developed well. Schurrle who was great from the off, has had less game time recently than Willian and, surprise surprise, his form has dropped. So what does that teach us?? Players I want blended in ?? Lets start up front and work back. Romelu Lukaku. Should have been kept by us, but Jose wanted to "teach him a lesson ". It's Jose who has been given the lesson, play talented young strikers who are 3 times better than the duds we had and the dud Jose bought. If he has an attitude problem, fix it, that's what Managers do. Patrick Bamford. Scores for fun at Derby, a team we had quite a tussle with. Definitely one to try. Lucas Piazon. Just the kind of midfielder we need. Nat Chalobah. Done enough to get a run. Wallace RB Patrick Van Aarnholt LB Nathan Ake Defender Tomas Kalas Defender. Thibout Courtois Goalkeeper. Many think is already better than Cech. Theres also an African kid, already an International defender, whose name eludes me. He might be Nigerian, but he looks very special. Where would I buy ?? Right now we need an experienced, proven goalscorer. Until Matic proves himself, and even if he does, we are desperate for a midfielder with flair ,vision and skill. We need another young ,quick central defender. And we need to play Bertrand more often. And just for the finish, Lamps, Cole, Cech and JT are on the way out. Ba and Eto'o should be goners even sooner, as will Essien. Mata and Luiz are more likely to leave than stay, so there's lots of places coming up for grabs. I contend we have the kids in the wings to fill at least some of them. I suspect Jose will just spend, spend and spend again instead. Hope I'm wrong.
All you say is dead right, but Jose has been brought back specifically to rebuild the team for the LONG TERM, to plug the chasm into which RAs' money flows, and to put us in a good position when the new Financial rules kick in. This mean whatever he has done in the past, ha cannot do in the future. Time to put to work his skills at selecting good players before they are superstars, and young player development. Not something he is noted for.
AVB had the same mandate and look how that went. Ultimately any rebuild and/or greater reliance on youth will be a slow burn.
Most Chelsea fans would love to see these players blooded but I think JT, FL, PC and Ash may last a bit longer than you think Piazon is a trequartista, is he really just the sort of player we need? We got a lot of them already, I guess he could be Oscar's understudy if we cash in on Mata.
He's played one game for Derby... Pretty much agree with the rest, Piazon will hopefully be played as he looks very special. Same with Omeruo (Nigerian CB), puzzled we haven't actually given him a try yet before loaning him out to Boro. Jose can't just start playing youngsters in his first season, he's got to win things before getting the chance to do that. If our board give him the time he needs to create his own squad of his own players then I believe he will have a great impact with our youngsters. I fully agree that Matic shouldn't have been purchased. I would much rather have seen De Bruyne given a chance to player a bit deeper as Mikel is perfect as a holding midfielder OR see Chalobah given a chance, however I trust Jose's choice of purchase and will happily support Matic. Besides we at least gained a healthy profit from De Bruyne and put it to good use.
As LOEW said above, Piazon is quality but if he hadn't have been loaned, we'd have another KDB situation. He's another attacking mid, a position we are overly stocked in, hence why KDB has been sold and Marin, Moses and Piazon have been loaned out. Drogs, I guess CP meant Mk Dons re Bamford. The difference in scoring in the championship to champions league is one hell of a difference. Needs a P.L loan next I think.
The thing with having so many young players here instead of out on loan is they're far more useful playing every game than every, lets say one in five if they stayed here. Like Van Aanholt would've been third, maybe even fourth choice LB had he stayed here instead he's helped Vitesse to the top end of the table and got a call up to the dutch squad. Same with Piazon, sixth or seventh choice here? Been one of the star players in the Dutch league. Everybody wants to see the young players brought on but sometimes it's just better to loan them out for the whole match experience. They don't all turn out perfect but we've had a hell of a lot more loans that have worked this season than the ones that haven't. IMO to have a chance of the first team squad they need a PL loan first (or at least a big european one). Chalobah is 18 he's got years left to reach potential, the same goes for most of the others. Players don't really ever stop learning so there is no rush to play them, especially the younger ones. As Drogs said too, Jose has to win things and the weight of expectation is so high that it is much harder to come back in your first season and start fielding all the youngsters. We have a lot of talented ones though and it'd be criminal if we got of them without us giving them a chance!
I'm quite looking forward to seeing him play tbh. Won best player in that league last season ahead of Martinez who got 38 in 44...
Big step up for Bamford from MK Dons to premiership. Let's see how his loan spell works at Derby. Then maybe he can get loaned to a Prem club to see if he is good enough
Another angle to this debate is that too many of our hyped up youngsters go on loan and don't perform to the levels expected of them. Its all well and good asking where chalobah is, but after that spell with Gianfranco last year he hasn't set the championship alight in his first spell at forrest and now is starting again at borough, the same with josh who we all agree im sure LOOKED a great prospect 2-3 years ago but stalled badly last year at borough again...now not for one second am i saying that we have a poor academy and none of our HG players should get a chance (bertrand, ake and chalobah are my 3 faves) but if you're jose with a brief to succeed, picking these players surely doesn't justify the risk of losing the odd game. Man U have quite a few HG players in their squad, look where they are now. As a by-product of how bad the national team is we've gained a mentailty of 1) young is best followed by 2) english is best-and again that's admirable, but as far as stakeholders in CFC are concerened (fans included) best should be best. Instead of trying to find where we can get away with putting players in the team, Lets focus on finding talent like Hazard and Oscar early on, and lets try and develop the next ramieres in surrey. if they're good enough even when they're young they will play!
All well thought out points, as were those of EC and 100 Years. Despite coming from different points of view, my take on the comments is that there is general agreement that at least a few kids will get a run in the near future. Hope they do, and can't wait to see them.