Chelsea Thread

I can't believe how Torres turned into such a useless player but even more irritating was Rafa keeping him on the pitch until the 80th minute and Demba Ba for 10 minutes had more shots on goal(even scored a goal which was onside for me) than Torres for 80.

Then Ivanovic was even more shocking tonight because we're already used with Torres. Two fatal errors which literally cost Chelsea the match are hard to forgive coming from a defender of his caliber.

I still think Chelsea can turn it around when I look back at their CL match against Napoli at home.
 
Typical Rafa. Instead of going for it he takes off a striker.

Two home games played against QPR and Swansea. 3 GOALS CONCEDED. 0 scored.

Benitez proving he his poor manager again and again. Feel sorry for you Chelsea supporter.
 
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I'm fed up with all the talk about Torres.
At Liverpool he was the best cf in the world. He isn't that good anymore but he still is a fine player. One could argue to give him the 2012 Golden Ball since he was the player who won most silverware in 2012: FA CUP, Champions League, European Champion and Golden Boot in that EC. I know i'm exagerating, but so do all the people who are criticising him way too much.
People also tend to forget that Swansea is a very good team that also has beaten Arsenal (and last season Manchester City).
The defeat against QPR was a freak defeat and Swansea are a very good team...only Man Utd never loose matches...
 
Chelsea have failed to score in 4 out of 6 home games under Rafa Benitez - that's poor by anyone's standards.

He'll be gone by May, if not before - and this stint won't do his reputation any good. He won't win the league, League Cup looking unlikely, they are out of Europe.

He needs a good FA Cup run.
 
Out of Europe? There was I thinking they were in the Europa League, with Inter - that Italian team you supported 10 days ago. In terms of home matches they're averageing at over two goals a game. If you're going to troll and be a WUM at least try and get your facts right.
 
Sorry, I meant Champions League.

And I am not trolling - just because you don't like my comments about Benitez doesnt mean I am 'trolling'.

Home matches? Two goals a game?! They scored 8 in one game (against one of the worst teams in the league), thats why! They have failed to score in FOUR home games! Can you imagine Man City or Man Utd doing that? Or even Arsenal?

The man can do no wrong in some people's eyes, I don't get it. He had a great spell at Valencia, and had a bit of luck by winning the CL with Liverpool (but all team need luck in that compeition so we'll let him have that glory) then took Liverpool OUT of the CL places to a midtable team by making poor signings and bad man management.

He's an average manager these days, end of story really. Ask any Man City, Arsenal, Man Utd fan if they would have Rafa as manager? Or ask a Milan, Barcelona, Real Madrid supporter. The answer you would get is 'NO WAY'! Why? Because he's not a top manager!

And what the hell has Inter got to do with this? This is Chelsea thread! FACHT!
 
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And I am not trolling - just because you don't like my comments about Benitez doesnt mean I am 'trolling'.
I agree with that. It's not because you don't share someone opinion that he is trolling.
I have an enormous respect for you and your fantastic posts edmundo, but when it concerns benni, you loose all sense of perspective.
 
All his posts are generally the same point over and over again. "Benitez is hopeless", "Liverpool are aweful", "Liverpool's fans are a laughing stock across the world". Maybe you really enjoy these wonderfully insightful posts Gerd, but to my mind they are just messing up the forum. He's done his best to make a mess of the Liverpool forum (by goading posters like Jags and Pipa), he tries to do in this forum by going on and on about Benitez, who has only been with the club for a matter of weeks, is ruining the team.

There is no rational discussion from him about Chelsea's problems, possible formation, there is no detail from him about how Benitez (or any other Chelsea manager) should improve the team tactically. In this thread its just post after post of him saying "Benitez is rubbish". I'm not saying that everyone posting here should talk about tactics or anything like that, but to just repeat the same line match after match is not constructive at all, in my opinion it's innflamatory. To me it's just a case of him trying to agitate other fans on here, as he seemingly did in his previous guises on here under different nommes de plume.
 
There's an 'ignore button' if you don't like my posts.

And where have I just repeated 'benitez is rubbish?' Do you have a concise and intelligent reply to the last post I made?

No you don't - you just criticise my posting style and because you don't like them, you attack me as a member and accuse me of being a 'troll'. In reality you just hold a flame for Benitez in your heart, which is fine. But don't critisize other members for posting valid points about Rafa in the CHELSEA thread.

Again just place me on 'ignore' if you dont agree with my posts. But my points about Benitez stand - and this is a Chelsea thread, not Liverpool.
 
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Home matches? Two goals a game?! They scored 8 in one game (against one of the worst teams in the league), thats why! They have failed to score in FOUR home games! Can you imagine Man City or Man Utd doing that? Or even Arsenal?!

Arsenal didn't score at home to Schalke, Swansea or Sunderland this season, so there is 3 of 4. Arguably Arsenal havent had as difficult home fixtures as Chelsea - once Arsenal have played Man City, Liverpool and Man Utd at home they'll almost certainly have hit 4 games without scoring. You say that Aston Villa are "one of the worst teams in the League", they might not be setting the world alight but they've beaten Liverpool, drawn with Arsenal and taken 4 from 6pts against Swansea this season. You focus on the home games Benitez has had, but you ingore the fact he's won at Everton and Norwich. He's the only manager so far this season to win at Everton in the league - Man Utd lost there, Arsenal and Liverpool drew there, and Everton drew away at City. Again Benitez's Chelsea are one of the few teams to have beaten Norwich away this season (Liverpool and City are the others). Norwich are reasonably impressive at home (beaten strong teams like Man Utd, Stoke, Arsenal in the league and Spurs in the Cup).

The man can do no wrong in some people's eyes, I don't get it. He had a great spell at Valencia, and had a bit of luck by winning the CL with Liverpool (but all team need luck in that compeition so we'll let him have that glory) then took Liverpool OUT of the CL places to a midtable team by making poor signings and bad man management.

I dont think there are many credible posters on here who think, "he can do no wrong", there are very few football fans who think this about any manager - even some Man Utd fans are questioning Ferguson's ideas about central midfield, Arsenal fans are questioning Wengers's ability to sign players, Liverpool fans are questioning Rodgers's over-use of the short passing game and his apparent reluctance over strikers. It happens, it's naive (or intentionally misleading) of you to suggest this isnt the case with Benitez and that he has a huge army of supporters who think he never made a single mistake.

You say he had luck to win the CL with Liverpool, obviously there were elements of luck in the way he won the final (and probably the match against Olympiakos), but they big teams like Juventus, Mourinho's Chelsea and Milan to win the CL in 2005 so I dont think it can all be down to luck, and if you say he was lucky in 2005 to win it, by contrast you can say he was unlucky not to win it in 2007. I think to dismiss his European achievements (three European finals (2 CL / 1UC) in the space of 3-4 years with two different teams) as "luck" is utter nonsense.

The stuff about him leading Liverpool out of the CL and into a midtable side is again a huge over-simplification to suit your one sided argument. It totally ignores the fact that the club\board were crisis at this time. They brought players in positions the team didn't need (e.g. Keane as striker), Benitez didn't help himself by deliberatly not selecting those players, but the club boardroom and management were heading in different directions. They had already flirted with other mangers (like Klinsmann, whom they spoke to when Bentiez was having his most successful season in the PL) and the team was never going to do well in 2009.
 
Thanks for the input, good posts but I don't agree with you.

If Benitez was such a good manager, why are Liverpool in the mess they are in today? Benitez had many years in charge of Liverpool but took them backwards, made bad signings, was too negative especially at home by drawing far too many games...

then he went to Inter, took a TREBLE winning side and also destroyed it.

I think we'll both have to agree to disagree on this one.

I do have a question though: Are you a Liverpool supporter? Because if you are, it would explain your passionate protection of Rafa, which is understandable.

But please, not that old excuse of blaming the owners! They gave Benitez plenty of cash to spend over the years.

But this isnt Liverpool thread so I'm out. We're never going to agree - I can't stand the arrogant man, he's simply an average manager who had a decent spell at Valencia and Liverpool for ONE season.
 
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Arsenal didn't score at home to Schalke, Swansea or Sunderland this season, so there is 3 of 4. Arguably Arsenal havent had as difficult home fixtures as Chelsea - once Arsenal have played Man City, Liverpool and Man Utd at home they'll almost certainly have hit 4 games without scoring. You say that Aston Villa are "one of the worst teams in the League", they might not be setting the world alight but they've beaten Liverpool, drawn with Arsenal and taken 4 from 6pts against Swansea this season. You focus on the home games Benitez has had, but you ingore the fact he's won at Everton and Norwich. He's the only manager so far this season to win at Everton in the league - Man Utd lost there, Arsenal and Liverpool drew there, and Everton drew away at City. Again Benitez's Chelsea are one of the few teams to have beaten Norwich away this season (Liverpool and City are the others). Norwich are reasonably impressive at home (beaten strong teams like Man Utd, Stoke, Arsenal in the league and Spurs in the Cup).



I dont think there are many credible posters on here who think, "he can do no wrong", there are very few football fans who think this about any manager - even some Man Utd fans are questioning Ferguson's ideas about central midfield, Arsenal fans are questioning Wengers's ability to sign players, Liverpool fans are questioning Rodgers's over-use of the short passing game and his apparent reluctance over strikers. It happens, it's naive (or intentionally misleading) of you to suggest this isnt the case with Benitez and that he has a huge army of supporters who think he never made a single mistake.

You say he had luck to win the CL with Liverpool, obviously there were elements of luck in the way he won the final (and probably the match against Olympiakos), but they big teams like Juventus, Mourinho's Chelsea and Milan to win the CL in 2005 so I dont think it can all be down to luck, and if you say he was lucky in 2005 to win it, by contrast you can say he was unlucky not to win it in 2007. I think to dismiss his European achievements (three European finals (2 CL / 1UC) in the space of 3-4 years with two different teams) as "luck" is utter nonsense.

The stuff about him leading Liverpool out of the CL and into a midtable side is again a huge over-simplification to suit your one sided argument. It totally ignores the fact that the club\board were crisis at this time. They brought players in positions the team didn't need (e.g. Keane as striker), Benitez didn't help himself by deliberatly not selecting those players, but the club boardroom and management were heading in different directions. They had already flirted with other mangers (like Klinsmann, whom they spoke to when Bentiez was having his most successful season in the PL) and the team was never going to do well in 2009.

Completely agree. /boom
 
then he went to Inter, took a TREBLE winning side and also destroyed it.

It's a bit of a toughie this... he took over from a team that was emotionally charged after Mourinho... this has happened to almost all of Mourinho's squads. He also got into arguments with the president and didn't get the players he wanted.

He's an easy target, but Inter didn't do any better with Gasperini who replaced him, and now Stramaccioni.
 
Maybe but we're not talking about Gasperini or Stramaccioni, we are talking about Rafa Benitez, manager of Chelsea.

If he was a great manager, I'd be the first to say...but he's not, it really is simple as that.

Can he be mentioned in same breath as Paisleys, Shankleys, Capellos, Fergusons, Del Bosque, Mourinhos etc ?

I dont think so. He's teams play shit on a stick football, too defensive, cant manage his players (they usually hate him). I simply dont get it.

I also dont get why he is above critism around here. Its like people cant see his mistakes and dress it up with "it was the owners fault" etc.

Who else spent all that money? Benitez DIDNT HAVE to sign the players he did. He chose to. He dismantled Houllier's squad that won him the CL and brought in some real bad buys.

The guy is out of touch.
 
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No I'm not a Liverpool supporter. I dont have a passionate protection of Bentiez, I just think that his achievements at Valencia (last non-Barca/Real manager to win the league) and in Europe with Liverpool are fairly good. I don't think he's the best manager in world football, (off the top of my head I'd pick a number of coachs like Hiddink, Mourinho, Simeone, Klopp, Ramon Diaz, perhaps even Bilic as better than him), but equally well I don't think he's a bad manager and given Chelsea had to get someone in mid-season I dont think he was a very bad choice. I think it's way to early for anyone to judge him at Chelsea. He has only just got to know the team and only now can he bring in new players (like Ba) and get rid of players to balance out the squad (and even then January is not a good time to do this compared to a summer transfer window).

For all their struggles in front of goal in those four matches, I think there are some objective Chelsea fans who can see some signs of promise. He's finally started to play David Luiz as a defensive midfielder, which is something that previous managers should have done a lot earlier. Aside from Ivanovic's horror show last night the defense is looking reasonably solid, with him and Cahill in the center and Cole and Alpiuzecuta on the flanks. They are still without John Terry (personally I probably wouldnt play him, but he would be a reasonable option on the bench) and since the Everton match have had Turnbull in goal (who is not really a top level goalie) due to Cech's injury. Turnbull wasnt really at fault for any of the goals last night, but a very good keeper (like Cech) might have been able to get something on Michu's shot. Without Terry and Cech Chelsea dont have a traditional experienced organiser in the back line, yet still their defence seems fairly good, it's not water-tight a la Milan in the 1990s, but Man Utd and even City (who were solid last year) have also looked shakey this year at the back.

Up front the big issue is Torres, Chelsea are creating enough chances from midfield and have enough attacking quality there to win games, but with Torres offering very little movement (and not that much finishing quality) opposition defences can push forward, largely ignoring him or assinging him one marker, and stifle Chelsea's midfield. If Benitez plays Ba more often I can see Chelsea's attack improving and I can see them scoring more goals. Although picking Ba ahead of Torres might not be down to Benitez if Gourlay, Buck and Abramovic insist on Torres starting.

As I said in my previous post I think Liverpool are still suffering from the ownership disaster of Hicks and Gillette. They had no clear vision and their financial planning was catastrophic, Liverpool as a club needed decisive boardroom leadership. Hicks and Gillette were muddled on their strategy in terms of moving/redeveloping Anfield. Benitez spent a lot at Anfield, he brought in some quality players a lot of the spend was on players for less than £10 million and generally squad players (the likes of Riera, Dossena, Benayoun, Kuyt, Sissoko and Crouch were all under £10m and a lot of them either at the club a long time, or were sold for similar prices). Even on big outlays (Torres £20m, Mascherano £18) were usually value for money (in the sense they were then sold on for more or similar fees, the only big exceptions perhaps being Aquliani (£20m), maybe Babel (£11-12m but sold for £8m) and Keane (£19m but a signing he was against) the jury is probably still out on Glenn Johnston (£18m). He also signed a number of very good players for small fees Lucas, Reina, Skrtel and Agger were all under £6m and Alonso was around £10m). At the end of his reign the board were signing players like Keane (and apparently negotiating the £20m value of Aquilani) yet selling off a lot of the squad. For instance in the last three summers when he was at Liverpool the club turned a profit on transfers. For whatever reasons, the board were economically downsizing Liverpool and the decline in team performances was bound to happen.
 
To be honest before Raffa came to Chelsea i tought he was finished. But IMO he's doing fine.
He had a difficult start but since loosing to Corinthians they are doing fine.
The loss against QPR was a freak loss. If Chelsea would have scored early in that match this could also have been an 8-0 win, and if Chelsea don't score immediately against Villa, they could have lost that match too...that is football. That is even what makes football attractive.

I haven't seen anything of the match against Swansea. Apparently (guessing by what i've read in this thread), they missed some chances and made some defensive howlers...these things happen, Swansea is a very good team and it's only the league cup...

I have a feeling that Benitez will do allright at Chelsea if he gets some time (which is a big if).

About the Liverpool thread: just like tik pointed out in that thread both Pipa and Benni are discussing. Pipa is a nice guy, but he is the most subjective fan i've ever come across. Not that he is unfair, but he simply can't see anything wrong with Liverpool...he see everything throug red tinted glasses. So if there is discussion it is between two persons.
 
No I'm not a Liverpool supporter. I dont have a passionate protection of Bentiez, I just think that his achievements at Valencia (last non-Barca/Real manager to win the league) and in Europe with Liverpool are fairly good. I don't think he's the best manager in world football, (off the top of my head I'd pick a number of coachs like Hiddink, Mourinho, Simeone, Klopp, Ramon Diaz, perhaps even Bilic as better than him), but equally well I don't think he's a bad manager and given Chelsea had to get someone in mid-season I dont think he was a very bad choice. I think it's way to early for anyone to judge him at Chelsea. He has only just got to know the team and only now can he bring in new players (like Ba) and get rid of players to balance out the squad (and even then January is not a good time to do this compared to a summer transfer window).

For all their struggles in front of goal in those four matches, I think there are some objective Chelsea fans who can see some signs of promise. He's finally started to play David Luiz as a defensive midfielder, which is something that previous managers should have done a lot earlier. Aside from Ivanovic's horror show last night the defense is looking reasonably solid, with him and Cahill in the center and Cole and Alpiuzecuta on the flanks. They are still without John Terry (personally I probably wouldnt play him, but he would be a reasonable option on the bench) and since the Everton match have had Turnbull in goal (who is not really a top level goalie) due to Cech's injury. Turnbull wasnt really at fault for any of the goals last night, but a very good keeper (like Cech) might have been able to get something on Michu's shot. Without Terry and Cech Chelsea dont have a traditional experienced organiser in the back line, yet still their defence seems fairly good, it's not water-tight a la Milan in the 1990s, but Man Utd and even City (who were solid last year) have also looked shakey this year at the back.

Up front the big issue is Torres, Chelsea are creating enough chances from midfield and have enough attacking quality there to win games, but with Torres offering very little movement (and not that much finishing quality) opposition defences can push forward, largely ignoring him or assinging him one marker, and stifle Chelsea's midfield. If Benitez plays Ba more often I can see Chelsea's attack improving and I can see them scoring more goals. Although picking Ba ahead of Torres might not be down to Benitez if Gourlay, Buck and Abramovic insist on Torres starting.

As I said in my previous post I think Liverpool are still suffering from the ownership disaster of Hicks and Gillette. They had no clear vision and their financial planning was catastrophic, Liverpool as a club needed decisive boardroom leadership. Hicks and Gillette were muddled on their strategy in terms of moving/redeveloping Anfield. Benitez spent a lot at Anfield, he brought in some quality players a lot of the spend was on players for less than £10 million and generally squad players (the likes of Riera, Dossena, Benayoun, Kuyt, Sissoko and Crouch were all under £10m and a lot of them either at the club a long time, or were sold for similar prices). Even on big outlays (Torres £20m, Mascherano £18) were usually value for money (in the sense they were then sold on for more or similar fees, the only big exceptions perhaps being Aquliani (£20m), maybe Babel (£11-12m but sold for £8m) and Keane (£19m but a signing he was against) the jury is probably still out on Glenn Johnston (£18m). He also signed a number of very good players for small fees Lucas, Reina, Skrtel and Agger were all under £6m and Alonso was around £10m). At the end of his reign the board were signing players like Keane (and apparently negotiating the £20m value of Aquilani) yet selling off a lot of the squad. For instance in the last three summers when he was at Liverpool the club turned a profit on transfers. For whatever reasons, the board were economically downsizing Liverpool and the decline in team performances was bound to happen.

Torres isnt Rafas fault I agree, he managed him perfectly at Liverpool and discovered the Gerrard/Torres partnership which worked so well when all other managers want to play Gerrard deep in midfield, so that was a touch of Benitez brilliance (see, I CAN praise him!).

Skrtel and Agger are a very overrated centre back pairing by Liverpool supporters and basically LFC need a lot better at the back if they want to compete with the best.

Johnson everyone knew about, it was a no brainer and he cost hell of a lot of money but he has come good.

But Rafa made so many poor signings, more bad than good.

But this is my last post in here because its not a LFC discussion.

Thanks for your very good posts Edmundo, they were good reads and I enjoyed them.

Sorry if I have offended you at all whilst posting here, not my intentions I promise (I know I can be a little arrogant)
 
If/ when Chelsea switch Torres and Falcao, I think they'll have arguably the best XI outside of La Liga's big two. On paper of course:

-------------cech-------------
-Azi----Cahill--Ivanovic-Cole-
--------Ramires-Luiz----------
---Mata-----Oscar----Hazard---
------------Falcao------------

With: Ba, Terry, Lampard, Mikel, Marin and so forth on the bench.

Looks really balanced, and very talented too.
 
"arguably" is a strong word, "beach". i for one think that would be an average squad (for a top club, i mean) and i believe "average" would be quite a generous label too.....
i definitely wouldn't consider that 11 among the best 11s in europe (nevermind "the best").

besides a team with only ramires and david luiz at midfield (and ashley cole as a leftback) would be everything but balanced.

off the top of my head juve, napoli, bayern, dortmund, man city and shaktar display better, more balanced (and also more talented) formations than that one, and theese are just the first ones which pop into my mind (and it's also worth mentioning that i didn't follow any ligue 1 at all this season, so ther might be also a few more teams to add).
but that's just my opinion, of course.
 
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I do think it would be interesting to see how well Falcao would do with the more physically imposing game in England. We've seen very technical teams like Chelsea and Arsenal get bullied by the more "brutish" teams the EPL has.
However, as we've seen many times before, the odds of a good player from La Liga doing well in the Premier League seem to be higher than the other way around.

As a United fan I'd hate to see Falcao join Chelsea or one of the other contenders, but as a football lover I think it would be a double win, both for those watching as well as for the league as a whole.
 
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I think Falcao has the build to be a success in England. He looks strong enough and pyhsical enough to mix it with any defenders and certainly showed Chelsea a thing or two in the Supercup.

Players of his quality can adapt and do well anywhere I would imagine. Would love to see him here on a regular basis but as you said, I'd hate to see him at Chelsea or City, wouldn't be good for us United fans.
 
I think Falcao has the build to be a success in England. He looks strong enough and pyhsical enough to mix it with any defenders and certainly showed Chelsea a thing or two in the Supercup.

Players of his quality can adapt and do well anywhere I would imagine. Would love to see him here on a regular basis but as you said, I'd hate to see him at Chelsea or City, wouldn't be good for us United fans.

Totally agree. I think his class would show through in any league.

If he cost more than £25m (which he obviously would) it would mean Chelsea have spent more than £200m on just their forward players in only 2 seasons. Cripes.
 
I think Falcao has the build to be a success in England. He looks strong enough and pyhsical enough to mix it with any defenders and certainly showed Chelsea a thing or two in the Supercup.

Players of his quality can adapt and do well anywhere I would imagine. Would love to see him here on a regular basis but as you said, I'd hate to see him at Chelsea or City, wouldn't be good for us United fans.

Wow ! didn`t think one would admit to it :LOL: We need players of his calibre in the league. We don`t have that flair anymore in the BPL
 
I have an enormous respect for you and your fantastic posts edmundo, but when it concerns benni, you loose all sense of perspective.

Disagreed.

For myself, Edmundo, our American friend and most others, he's the same troll he always was. Very rarely is there any actual insight to his posts rather than the same rigid opinions.

He also used to hate Serie A and Italian Football and would criticize it every chance he had. Saying they're old, boring, etc. So it was interesting that he chose to be an Inter fan in his new mask.

You're one of the very few people who seems to enjoy his posts Gerd and I think that's because you're a very kind man and he complimented you a few times in an effort to make a few friends here. A little while ago, he complimented you saying he likes your posts on a few things and you two had a nice little exchange and so now you're defending him but he's an imposter and very few like him. And there are good reasons for that, some of which Edmundo has gone over.

All his posts are generally the same point over and over again. "Benitez is hopeless", "Liverpool are aweful", "Liverpool's fans are a laughing stock across the world". Maybe you really enjoy these wonderfully insightful posts Gerd, but to my mind they are just messing up the forum. He's done his best to make a mess of the Liverpool forum (by goading posters like Jags and Pipa), he tries to do in this forum by going on and on about Benitez, who has only been with the club for a matter of weeks, is ruining the team.

There is no rational discussion from him about Chelsea's problems, possible formation, there is no detail from him about how Benitez (or any other Chelsea manager) should improve the team tactically. In this thread its just post after post of him saying "Benitez is rubbish". I'm not saying that everyone posting here should talk about tactics or anything like that, but to just repeat the same line match after match is not constructive at all, in my opinion it's innflamatory. To me it's just a case of him trying to agitate other fans on here, as he seemingly did in his previous guises on here under different nommes de plume.

Exactly. :WORSHIP:

Same guy. Same opinions. Same old boring crap but under a different username and altered fav club.

I would have no problem with him continuing to post here but at least admit that you're the reincarnation of ninjabreaks, plan M and there's probably a few others I'm forgetting here!
 
I strongly sympathize with Walters.
And about the penalty: it's better to miss a penalty when loosing 0-4 than in close match....

May Walters win many matches for Stoke, for example against teams like Manchester City, Liverpool and Man Utd.

Great goal from Hazard.
 
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Great result for Chelsea yesterday. Watch them go and draw against Southampton or someone at home in a few weeks now.
 
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