My Blood Is Blue

If we’re going to use win percentage and trophies won as a basis to judge players then Havertz is better than Harry Kane! All managers do say things like that, which is why those kind of quotes prove nothing in relation to how good Havertz is now or was when he played for us. How close he was to Tuchel doesn’t impact his quality either. But let’s just agree to disagree, otherwise we’ll keep going around in circles.

What stats would you choose to prove otherwise? With regards to Tuchcel’s comments on Havertz, I think you could replace Tuchel’s name with most managers and Havertz name with one of the players in their squad/that they used to coach and it would read the same and has probably been repeated numerous times.

So with Enzo out, hopefully we’ll see a return to Gallagher and Caicedo as a 2 and Chuk will get a chance in the more advanced role. God knows what back 4 he’ll pick… he’ll probably rest Cucurella and play Mudryk there for a laugh.

Captain. Leader. Legend. What a great interview, it's great to hear all the stories and the details of his upbringing spoken about so openly. I'm so glad his Mum went against his Dad and signed the contract! The AVB story is really interesting... sounds like he'd lost the senior players before he even started. JT's reaction to just Benitez's name is brilliant! I also very much like his comments about Gallagher as captain. Get him involved in the first team in some capacity, please.

That was always one of my biggest issues, he doesn't seem to fit any position. He is not a striker, he is definitely not a winger, he isn't a CM and he isn't good enough to play the 'number 10' role and so where do you play him?! He is a luxury player that isn't very luxurious.

Based on what? If we can’t base it on goal returns then what do we base it on? I presume we base it on what we all believe the ability levels to be? In which case we have to put potential in there as well. If that’s what we’re basing it on then I’d say Palmer is a clear upgrade and I would probably say Jackson if not an upgrade, definitely isn’t a downgrade based on the impact he has on the team with his work rate plus his potential to improve over the next few seasons. The thing with Havertz is that he often ghosted through games, making very little impact and he also showed no real sign of improvement over his time here. This may be a bit harsh, but he strikes me as a bit lazy.

If we took this Palmer (his current age, experience etc) and put him in the team under Tuchel, I honestly think he scores about the same amount of goals as he has this season. My reasoning is, Palmer isn’t scoring the goals he is scoring because of coaching or even the system he is playing in. A lot of his goals are down to his individual ability and brilliance. Also, under Tuchel, we didn’t have a lack of chances, we just didn’t have players to put those chances away. Look at the records or those players after Tuchel left, do you see any improvement in the goal returns? Nope.

Havertz scored 32 goals in 139 appearances for Chelsea, which is a goal every 4.3 matches. Jackson has scored 13 in 38 appearances so far this season, which is a goal every 2.9 matches. Havertz's best season for us produced 14 goals in 47 matches, Jackson is 1 off that total in 9 fewer games. Havertz has played 47 matches so far this season, 9 more than Jackson and he is playing in a better team and yet Havertz still has 1 goal less than Jackson. Havertz scored a massive goal for us in the Champions League final and was part of that Champions League winning team, which was brilliant. Do you know how many other goals Havertz got in the Champions League that season? None. You could argue, that he scored when it mattered most, but to have suggested he won us the Champions League is hyperbole at best. Havertz was not a success at Chelsea. He wasn't a failure, but he definitely was not the player we all hoped he would be, so to start suggesting differently now, feels very strange.

We do have a habit of getting it very wrong, don't we? But we aren't the only ones. Manchester United most expensive signings: 1st Pogba - £89m 2nd Antony - £82m 3rd Maguire - £80m 4th Lukaku - £75m 5th Sancho - £73m 6th Casemiro - £60m 7th Di Maria - £59.7 8th Fred - £47m 9th Bruno Fernandes - £46.5 10th Martial - £36m

I’d suggest Chelsea are imploding as well, but we’ve not been consistent enough all season to be able to implode.

My wife is American so I can confirm, they’re not all bad!

Newcastle losing opens the door for us, so I fully expect us to slam it shut in our own faces.

This really surprises me, you've been his number one fan for so long!

He had a chance to shoot but never shot, therefore it doesn't register as a shot at goal and therefore the chance of him scoring is zero. Don't shoot, you can't score.

This isn’t all on Poch, I posted in the match topic this morning calling out all the other areas that should be blamed and need to be changed, so I’m not putting all of this solely on the head coach. I am going to castigate him for picking them both last night though as I don’t believe he had to and I don’t believe he should have done. The minute I saw the back 4 he picked, I knew what was coming. Managers do make bad calls and have bad luck, of course they do, but he is making them far too regularly for it to be acceptable. As I said, he is not the only issue at the club, but he is one of them.