Football

Liverpool have had to cancel today’s open top bus parade then?

Was bummed out, last night, thinking we were going to lose to Watford and the only thing making me happy was knowing that Chelsea were losing to Bournemouth.
Watched motd and was overjoyed that llorente overcame that miss, that he was getting in the right positions, being involved in the action and looking like the striker we thought we were getting.
Loved the joy as he ran to pochettino to celebrate. Loved son swearing like a trooper after he scored the equaliser.
Loved the fact we’re a couple of points closer to city and we’ve got son back for the next couple of games, especially Dortmund.

Liverpool clearing the snow only on the attacking end is a pretty pathetic tactic.

We weren't terrible in the first half, toothless but not terrible... Second half was awful, obvs... Stories of Sarri locking himself in the dressing room after the game with just the players, would love to be a fly on the wall...

As a side note, no point having a centre forward if you're gonna try and walk it into the net, innit? We'll bounce back eventually but still really hope we can make the top four... Nothing has changed...

Sarri: "maybe I can't motivate them"

Serious question.
How do you motivate players?
Pep isn't exactly a cuddle monster, he's obviously hard work and a task master or he wouldn't get results.

What's the difference between sarri, pep, and Rafa ?

Seriously. Because, I think Rafa would work with the Chelsea players (though not the fans obvs) and get results and get them motivated.
Pep because everyone would think "OMFG I'm working with the Mekon brain of football'

Sarri has won stuff, knows organisation, so what's failing?
Is it because he smokes?

I think, the way we're set up, opponents can see us coming... Simple as that... Sarri hasn't shown us he can shuffle a deck, we knew that was his MO at Napoli, we're a bit fucked if he can't do it now... No sense blaming the players if we do get up the pitch but teams sit back and hit us on the break... If we don't get an early goal we're compromised...

But I remember when we were really shit, I ain't gonna poo my pants about our current league position...

Despite if I remember correctly @jaw assertion about great managers having won something early doors, Sarri hasn’t won anything, and his career has been long.
Guardiola is about coaching players and making them better, treating them like intelligent beings and getting them to perform better and engage with the game in a more intense way.
Klopp and pochettino are about engaging with the player as a person and making them better people and better players because they can connect with them as human beings..

Not sure how Sarri connects with his players, if he knows them as people or improved them technically as players.
Chelsea is a difficult situation because the players there know they can get rid of a manager if they don’t agree with how they treat them, want them to play. And Sarri has to overcome the perception that the players will be there for longer than he will, even though he’s only 6 months into a 3 yr contract.
If he can get through this season, and get a full pre season in he’ll be in a better position. Though it depends on if this transfer ban comes in, may make it difficult/impossible for him to improve the team..

Klopp and Pochettino haven't won anything either...

In the Prem... Obvs...

Sarri seems blinkered in his view on Jorginho, he doesn't offer enough going forward and is not great defensively either. Kante is way better in that holding position and no way would they have conceded 4 if he was there, yet Sarri still can't see it. He's showing Jose type stubbornness.

Playing Jorg, Kante and Kova in midfield against Bournemouth, really? It doesn't offer much in the way of guile and goal threat, Bournemouth just targeted Jorg and that was that, no plan B. It was easy in the end and that must be a major worry, we're not talking Champs League semi's, but Bournemouth, BOURNEMOUTH. Malmo will fancy their chances in the euro milk cup or whatever it is.

Will the January window see any big signings or will it be its usual damp squib, I suspect the latter, Fellaini's off to China.....not a single fuck was given.

You fucking leave fellaini alone.

I will, I wouldn't touch him with yours ;)

Making them better people - really?

By all accounts. Can only go on what I’ve read but Poch seems to really care about his players, and how they develop as people as well as footballers..
supposedly spurs players are a respectful, polite bunch of young men.

;-)

We’ve pretty much hired the Italian Bielsa. It either works out or it’ll end up like Scolari or AVB.

We’re still competing on three fronts which isn’t bad all things considered. If he’s (Sarri) happy and he gets backed up by the board I can’t see why it’s not going to work out in the medium (2 years) term.

We’re Chelsea after all. We don’t plan for our managers to stay long term. Which is fine as long as we’re competing and winning a trophy every two years.

Excellent, we've signed Peter Crouch (and lost Vokes, one of my favourite players). Good to see our new recruitment guy is earning his corn.

On the motivation side, I was listening to a Dyche interview where he was saying that a psychologist compiled pen pictures for each player including the best way to motivate them (whether they reacted well to a bollocking, arm round the shoulder, etc)

Yeah but bielsa has actually won stuff, admittedly early doors in Argentina, but still..
I think Sarri is just reaping the lack of a pre season and not having had time to figure out what his personnel can do.
If you give him a chance he’ll come good, think his teams play better football than scolari’s and avb’s but it’s whether you can live with this as a holding station season, rather than a “we should be winning trophies” season (unless you win the league cup or the Europa league) I’d give you better odds of winning the Europa league..

Thought I made it quite clear. I’ll hapily take 4th and a cup final appearance in his first year. As long as we’re improving I’m not complaining.

Last nights result was a proper slap in the face.

Footballer being polite young man / men

https://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/premier-league/tottenham-serge-aurier-arrest-hencha-voigt-a8729931.html

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2018/aug/24/hugo-lloris-tottenham-goalkeeper-charged-drink-driving

Not winning things won't wash at Chelsea.

Last night was the worst league defeat for 22 years.

I'm sure you can remember worse defeats Clive.

A 4-0 defeat has been good result for us in the last 22 years.