Rival watch

  • Please bear with us on the new site integration and fixing any known bugs over the coming days. If you can not log in please try resetting your password and check your spam box. If you have tried these steps and are still struggling email [email protected] with your username/registered email address
  • Log in now to remove adverts - no adverts at all to registered members!
Yid Vicious said:
He looked a typical Mourinho player but with Willian already playing the same role, it was a strange decision to pay so much for him. Considering they really look like they're lacking a number 10, Mourinho really made poor calls by selling De Bruyne and Mata.
Click to expand...

De Bruyne was a poor decision, but I'm not sure about the Mata one. He's not really looked the part at United and despite his impressive stats, he seems to drift out of games an awful lot. Couldn't see him fitting into this Chelsea team, anyway. Plus, they got nearly £40m for him.
 
BrunelGooner said:
De Bruyne was a poor decision, but I'm not sure about the Mata one. He's not really looked the part at United and despite his impressive stats, he seems to drift out of games an awful lot. Couldn't see him fitting into this Chelsea team, anyway. Plus, they got nearly £40m for him.
Click to expand...

Mata was Chelsea's best player when Jose arrived. Mourinho's a stubborn manager and would never have changed his system to suit players but he should have. Mata has been a disappointment at United but in his defence, he's playing in a team that are pretty disappointing overall. There's no point getting exciting, creative players and then having them play bland football.

Mourinho just beats the creativity out of his teams. At Real he played Modric as a number 10 for the first half of the season despite the fact that it wasn't working and he still did it for big games after that. It's been the same story with Fabregas. Anyone can see how much better he is playing in a deeper role yet come the big games he's always pushed forward, where he was ineffective for Barca, so he can fit another defensive player into the team. What's happened to Willian has been sad, he was such an exciting player to watch a few years back, scoring great goals and now he's just a right back playing a bit higher up the pitch.

The same would've happened to De Bruyne and Mata if they'd stayed but they were still poor decisions from Mourinho to sell.
 
Boss said:
I never watched all of the game but according to Mourinho he said City deserved to be 2 nil up at half time but second half he took off Terry to counter Citys tactical change, so he needed Zouma instead of Terry, to push the defensive line higher, and that Chelsea had control of the game second half.

If Hazard had taken his chance and made it 2-1, he is maybe thinking that would be a fair result, but the 3-0 thumping he isn't used to being on the end of.
Click to expand...

Nonsense. City would've been out of sight by HT had it not been for Begovic. Terry was pulled b/c he looked like an old has been trying to deal with the best striker in the league. Zouma brought pace and strength.

Even in the second half when Chelsea were admittedly improved as Sterling and Aguero tired, City still kept possession with alarming ease for extended periods of time. There just never looked to be much urgency to Chelsea today, which is very unusual for a Mourinho team. Not that I'm complaining :1980_boogie_down:
 
Boss said:
I never watched all of the game but according to Mourinho he said City deserved to be 2 nil up at half time but second half he took off Terry to counter Citys tactical change, so he needed Zouma instead of Terry, to push the defensive line higher, and that Chelsea had control of the game second half.

If Hazard had taken his chance and made it 2-1, he is maybe thinking that would be a fair result, but the 3-0 thumping he isn't used to being on the end of.
Click to expand...

Sounds like Mourinho needs to see a doctor <whistle>.
 
We've barely reached the middle of August, yet so many pundits and fans have already reached conclusions about how teams will perform over the course of a season that has nine months yet to run! Four seasons to go in fact - the rest of summer, autumn, winter and spring.
 
littleDinosaurLuke said:
We've barely reached the middle of August, yet so many pundits and fans have already reached conclusions about how teams will perform over the course of a season that has nine months yet to run! Four seasons to go in fact - the rest of summer, autumn, winter and spring.
Click to expand...

Football debates/phone-ins/forums need people to say with confidence how they see the season panning out and which team will be champions or reach top four, no sitting on the fence Luke, can Spurs get top four and will City win the title?
 
Boss said:
Football debates/phone-ins/forums need people to say with confidence how they see the season panning out and which team will be champions or reach top four, no sitting on the fence Luke, can Spurs get top four and will City win the title?
Click to expand...

What do I think? Erm,....Spurs can get top four and City can win the title, but I wouldn't say will to either. I think most sides will still do some transfer business in this window and that may have a bearing.
Spurs need more players, otherwise you face the same problems as last season with two games per week, which takes its toll.

If I was a betting man (which I'm not - it's a mug's game), I don't think Spurs will get top four. I see this season panning out much the same as last with the top four keeping their places, although City might edge out Chelsea. I'll say that they will because Chelsea had their transfer business sorted out early last season and the players they brought in (Costa, Fabregas & Matic in particular) had an immediate impact. This time, they haven't been able to get their targets, the squad is a bit thin and they've started poorly. They are already playing catch up.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: Boss
It wasn't a great weekend for us, but the Chelski result has cheered me up a bit, particularly after all the antics by the Special One during the week. Let's not forget that his rants during the week stopped proper discussion of a very bad performance by his team last weekend which they deserved to lose.
 
Citeh back in their binary groove it seems.
Why they cannot put up a good showing the season after they win the PL
is beyond me.
 
Boss said:
More from Jose Mourinho, on BBC Sport: "It is a fake result. We were the best team by far in the second half. What they did in the first we did in the second.

"We dominated and when they feel they are in trouble, and they felt, they changed Aguero and Sterling, they try to recover control of the game is exactly when they scored the second goal. For me, completely fake.

"Their goalkeeper was good and we couldn't score. They were only coming up with long balls and even that we controlled that. Not one single problem in the second half, they had lots."

"Ten seconds of the game and Aguero was behind mydefensive line. We started immediately bad."
Click to expand...

In Mourinho's defence(not often I do this!) he did say after we lost 3-0 at Stamford Bridge last season that the scoreline was unfair on us.

I get why he might feel aggrieved by the scoreline as Hazard had a great chance and Ramires had a goal wrongly ruled out for offside(although it was near impossible for the lino to see it). City were a always a threat throughout the game though and created far more chances. Chelsea were really only in the game for about half an hour. Regardless, City were the best side in every department and by a distance so 3-0 doesn't flatter them at all.
 
Yid Vicious said:
In Mourinho's defence(not often I do this!) he did say after we lost 3-0 at Stamford Bridge last season that the scoreline was unfair on us.

I get why he might feel aggrieved by the scoreline as Hazard had a great chance and Ramires had a goal wrongly ruled out for offside(although it was near impossible for the lino to see it). City were a always a threat throughout the game though and created far more chances. Chelsea were really only in the game for about half an hour. Regardless, City were the best side in every department and by a distance so 3-0 doesn't flatter them at all.
Click to expand...

I quite like Jose, he managed one of my favourite foreign club sides, with Eto and that inter milan side which won the treble. Most fans get taken in by his arrogance but I find him to be a reasonable man that understands the game and generally gets on great with his players.

The media side of him is just that, him playing a game (which doesn't always work).
 
  • Like
Reactions: O.Spurcat
Boss said:
I quite like Jose, he managed one of my favourite foreign club sides, with Eto and that inter milan side which won the treble. Most fans get taken in by his arrogance but I find him to be a reasonable man that understands the game and generally gets on great with his players.

The media side of him is just that, him playing a game (which doesn't always work).
Click to expand...

I enjoyed him at Inter, and I wasn't too fussed about him at Real. At an arms length he's quite tolerable, especially when he was taking forward an underdog like Inter were when he won the CL, or even with his battle against one of the great football sides with Real trying to take on Barca.

When he's in the Premier League you can't get away from him though, you're stuck with him at close quarters and you can't ignore his childishness. He just lacks any class, just like the club he's at. So far he's blamed medical staff, gouged a Barca coach's eye, talked up ridiculous conspiracy theories, repeatedly walks out of press conferences, threatens the media, tapped up players when clubs aren't selling to him and numerous other problems. Even when he's winning he's insufferable, he frequently goes well beyond what's acceptable in talking about Wenger and other managers, he tried to shake hands with Lambert and Keane before the end of the match and generally goes out of his way to behave like an arse. In keeping with his personality, the football he plays is also extremely negative, which is fine when you're fighting the odds as an underdog but with the millions that Chelsea put in there's really no excuse.

I was trying to be fair to him with the reminder that he said the samething when he beat us 3-0 but these moments are few and far between. Instead of accepting that his side were well beaten on New Year's Day at the Lane, he went on about how he didn't get a penalty and how that changed the whole game.

So yeah, we disagree about Mourinho, basically <laugh>
 
I absolutely can't stand that Nazi salute type celebration that Brendan Rogers does.
And totally agree YV you can imagine if it had been Bournemouth it would have been ruled out for offside. And it rubs salt in the wound that Bournemouth had a goal ruled out for what looked like something very innocuous.
 
  • Like
Reactions: O.Spurcat
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top Bottom
Back