Chelsea 0 Brentford 2

[ROTG]

7 hours ago, Mark Kelly said:

Hilarious. 

Blaming the players who didn't even play. 

 

Pay attention where did I mention the line up for last night.  
 

BTW the game ended with 4 of the sports department signings. 

[chrisb]

17 minutes ago, ROTG said:

Pay attention where did I mention the line up for last night.  
 

BTW the game ended with 4 of the sports department signings. 

Every time I see the “Sports department” I can’t help thinking of “Are You Being Served”! (Showing my age here)

TB “Captain Peacock we need a midfielder”,

Captain Peacock ”Certainly Mr Bohely, I’ll get Mrs Slocombe on it right away”

Mr Humphries “I’m free!”

[ROTG]

8 minutes ago, chrisb said:

Every time I see the “Sports department” I can’t help thinking of “Are You Being Served”! (Showing my age here)

TB “Captain Peacock we need a midfielder”,

Captain Peacock ”Certainly Mr Bohely, I’ll get Mrs Slocombe on it right away”

Mr Humphries “I’m free!”

We are certainly as calamitous as that particular Grace Brothers department. 
 

another OG. 

[Blue Orca]

51 minutes ago, chrisb said:

Every time I see the “Sports department” I can’t help thinking of “Are You Being Served”! (Showing my age here)

TB “Captain Peacock we need a midfielder”,

Captain Peacock ”Certainly Mr Bohely, I’ll get Mrs Slocombe on it right away”

Mr Humphries “I’m free!”

Sorry, Mrs Slocombe is busy playing with her pussy!

[Holymoly]

4 hours ago, thevelourfog said:

I don't think anyone expected this season to go this badly. I was dubious of Boehly and Eghbali from very early on, but even in my least charitable thoughts the notion that they'd almost instantly lead us to near or actual relegation didn't cross my mind.

Quite honestly I think they truly want success on the pitch and they are prepared to spend money to achieve that. This is not purely a financial exercise the way it is at Spuds, I hope. It is just unfortunate that they didn't save some of their money by employing someone with experience of running a football club that could have advised them where the money should have been spent first.

[Ham]

27 minutes ago, Blue Orca said:

Sorry, Mrs Slocombe is busy playing with her pussy!

Anyone who isn't familiar with the series will be frantically googling right now 😂

[Blue Orca]

5 hours ago, Holymoly said:

You think that a new manager and a striker that can turn this around? The idea that the new season arrives and everyone starts from square one again is a trite misnomer. Managers have become the same as players, they come for the money and don't really care if they win or lose as if they get sacked they become a millionaire overnight anyway and there's always another club willing to take them on. The only truly elite manager in the the league is Pep, in that he is able to develop and improve a squad long term. Even Klopp has shown how fragile success can be this season. I'm not saying Poccettino won't get a tune out the squad to begin with but I guarantee any improvment will be brittle and prone to collapsing in on itself once again once they hit the first bump in the road. I don't see anything behind the scenes, be it the coaching staff, the director of football, the board or the owners that will be able to instill any sense of stability at the club. Like I said in my previous post this is a new club and you need to build foundations and develop from the ground up. Instead, the owners have attempted to build a skyscraper on roller skates in quicksand.

This isn't 2003 where we can just spend our way to success. Every team in the league has fortunes to spend on players, it comes down to employing the right people behind the scenes and allowing them to do their jobs without micromanaging them. We were promised moneyball when Clearlake bought the club. I assumed that would involve identifying the quality of players and not just assume a big price tag meant a great player. As it turns out moneyball in this instance just means paying fortunes for untried players and amortising their value over 8 years instead of 4.

No, I don't think we have much better to look forward to next season.

I did say maybe 2 forwards 🙂  Of course it will be better next season. It won't be a PL winning season but it will be better. Mark my words.

[JaneB]

1 hour ago, Blue Orca said:

Sorry, Mrs Slocombe is busy playing with her pussy!

 

32 minutes ago, Ham said:

Anyone who isn't familiar with the series will be frantically googling right now 😂

I wondered how long it would be before someone mentioned that.

Didn’t dare myself 🤭

[Blue Moon]

For those who didn’t Google it … 

 

[east lower]

2 hours ago, Blue Orca said:

Sorry, Mrs Slocombe is busy playing with her pussy!

I’m sure stroking it was used!! 🤣

Used to have a boyish soft spot for Miss Brahms (late, great Wendy Richards).

[Chelsea_Matt]

4 hours ago, Blue Orca said:

Sorry, Mrs Slocombe is busy playing with her pussy!

And I am unanimous in that!

[Blue Orca]

3 hours ago, east lower said:

I’m sure stroking it was used!! 🤣

Used to have a boyish soft spot for Miss Brahms (late, great Wendy Richards).

Yes or the nurse that used to accompany old Mr Grace 😀

[RDCW]

18 minutes ago, Blue Orca said:

Yes or the nurse that used to accompany old Mr Grace 😀

Wasn't it Young Mr Grace (who was hilariously ancient)? I'm not sure Old Mr Grace made an appearance.

1 minute ago, RDCW said:

Wasn't it Young Mr Grace (who was hilariously ancient)? I'm not sure Old Mr Grace made an appearance.

I've checked and whilst Old Mr Grace was unseen in the first 7 series (a device similar to Mrs Walowitz in The Big Bang Theory) he did appear in series 8!

[Sleeping Dave]

16 hours ago, thevelourfog said:

Different strains of decline with different causes, imo.

In the last 10 years, we have become one of a pack of boom-or-bust teams who can only compete with a state-funded (and illegally, in FFP terms lest we forget) club every few years. We can bide time and build, and then go all out for a brief period before being overtaken by the club who can do literally whatever they want. I don't say that as a moral criticism, just an observation of fact. Sometimes we've got that building right, sometimes wrong, and often only marginally one way or another. It is why we've managed a few league titles, a few Europas and a CL in that time.  Aside from that state-backed club, only Liverpool come close to that. Our standing, or at least what it was in August 2022, is much more about City's emergence and FFP impunity than it is any failing of ours (even though there have been failings).

What we have seen since Boehly came in is completely different. In fact, you could even make the argument that what we're seeing now has parallels with what we hypothetically might have seen if we hasn't accepted a place in the boom-or-bust pack and had pushed hard to compete with kneejerk, high-risk financial decisions. We haven't just declined from elite to one of a pack. We've fallen off a complete cliff from one of a pack to lucky to stay in the league. We were not on this trajectory, not even close.

You make your point solely from a domestic perspective. There are a number of European clubs that have outperformed us and who are not state-owned entities. Also, competing with City is not impossible. After all, it’s not City that has ensured our league finishes from 2012 onwards were 6, 3, 3, 1, 10, 1, 5, 3, 4, 4, 3. Yes we won two league titles. One with JM back when City were in a somewhat rebuilding phase and one with Conte with no European football. 

We haven’t been consistent challengers for a decade. We haven’t even challenged City properly. 

[ROTG]

9 hours ago, RDCW said:

I've checked and whilst Old Mr Grace was unseen in the first 7 series (a device similar to Mrs Walowitz in The Big Bang Theory) he did appear in series 8!

Young Mr Grace was in the feature film

I'll get my coat for remembering that

 

[thevelourfog]

14 minutes ago, Sleeping Dave said:

You make your point solely from a domestic perspective. There are a number of European clubs that have outperformed us and who are not state-owned entities. Also, competing with City is not impossible. After all, it’s not City that has ensured our league finishes from 2012 onwards were 6, 3, 3, 1, 10, 1, 5, 3, 4, 4, 3. Yes we won two league titles. One with JM back when City were in a somewhat rebuilding phase and one with Conte with no European football. 

We haven’t been consistent challengers for a decade. We haven’t even challenged City properly. 

Erm ... I literally said we're boom-or-bust and made no suggestion that we have been consistent challengers. My whole point is no one has been, and I don't think anyone (other than emerging state-owned clubs) ever will be again. City's title win in 2012 changed the landscape entirely. It changed what we could do, and even tried to do. My whole point is that doing what would be needed to be "consistent challengers" (and it literally is spending, even more than the huge amount we have) became impossible. Competing with them during high points of a team's development, doable. We've seen that. Competing with them every year ... It's evidently not been doable, not by anyone in the last 11 years. I'm going to hold the league tables and who has won the title over the last 11 years with greater weight than your opinion that it isn't impossible to compete with City.

Which European clubs have outperformed us in the period we've been talking about? Who has 2 CLs and 2 ELs in the last 11 years? Madrid blow us out of the water, as they do literally every team in Europe. Bayern and Barca are in the mix. Maybe Sevilla if you want to include the EL. There are teams who you might make the argument have been better game to game, but who haven't competed with us when it comes to the important thing, the exact thing you were talking about. Titles.

The trajectory over the 10 years previous to this was up and down. Push hard to compete, fall back, spend some time developing, push hard to compete, and repeat. You give the evidence for that in your post.

The trajectory now is ... Rely on other teams to avoid relegation. This year is not the inevitable progression of what has been seen in the last decade, and it really is strange anyone would say otherwise. 

 

[kev61]

On 27/04/2023 at 23:41, RDCW said:

Wasn't it Young Mr Grace (who was hilariously ancient)? I'm not sure Old Mr Grace made an appearance.

I've checked and whilst Old Mr Grace was unseen in the first 7 series (a device similar to Mrs Walowitz in The Big Bang Theory) he did appear in series 8!

When will young Mr Grace come into our dressing room and say... "you'r all doing very well".

Edited April 29, 2023 by kev61

[Michael Tucker]

22 minutes ago, kev61 said:

When will young Mr Grace come into our dressing room and say... "you'r all doing very well".

Hasn't he done that already?

[kev61]

18 minutes ago, Michael Tucker said:

Hasn't he done that already?

When?

45 minutes ago, kev61 said:

When will young Mr Grace come into our dressing room and say... "you'r all doing very well".

Should be...."you've all done very well".

[Michael Tucker]

9 minutes ago, kev61 said:

When?

Lighten up kev, it was a joke! 

 

[kev61]

3 minutes ago, Michael Tucker said:

Lighten up kev, it was a joke! 

 

Ok chum my bad.

[kev61]

On 27/04/2023 at 18:30, Ham said:

Anyone who isn't familiar with the series will be frantically googling right now 😂

Probably around the same time as captain pugwash and "master bates".?

[Sleeping Dave]

23 hours ago, thevelourfog said:

Erm ... I literally said we're boom-or-bust and made no suggestion that we have been consistent challengers. My whole point is no one has been, and I don't think anyone (other than emerging state-owned clubs) ever will be again. City's title win in 2012 changed the landscape entirely. It changed what we could do, and even tried to do. My whole point is that doing what would be needed to be "consistent challengers" (and it literally is spending, even more than the huge amount we have) became impossible. Competing with them during high points of a team's development, doable. We've seen that. Competing with them every year ... It's evidently not been doable, not by anyone in the last 11 years. I'm going to hold the league tables and who has won the title over the last 11 years with greater weight than your opinion that it isn't impossible to compete with City.

Which European clubs have outperformed us in the period we've been talking about? Who has 2 CLs and 2 ELs in the last 11 years? Madrid blow us out of the water, as they do literally every team in Europe. Bayern and Barca are in the mix. Maybe Sevilla if you want to include the EL. There are teams who you might make the argument have been better game to game, but who haven't competed with us when it comes to the important thing, the exact thing you were talking about. Titles.

The trajectory over the 10 years previous to this was up and down. Push hard to compete, fall back, spend some time developing, push hard to compete, and repeat. You give the evidence for that in your post.

The trajectory now is ... Rely on other teams to avoid relegation. This year is not the inevitable progression of what has been seen in the last decade, and it really is strange anyone would say otherwise. 

 

Great argument, if the spending thing was true. Which it isn’t. City hasn’t even been the biggest spenders over the last five season. In fact eight clubs have outspend them, nine if you count us and the insane splash we’ve done in 22/23. 

https://www.transfermarkt.com/premier-league/fuenfjahresvergleich/wettbewerb/GB1

Teams are certainly spending a lot of money, and more than City, to try to compete. The problem is that the money they spend isn’t utilised to the same effect. What City has done great is exactly what we should have done but lacked the competence to do;

- Build a new ground

- Secure a sound structure around the club

- Recruitment that fits their strategy 

- Clear strategy what type of football they want to play

- Get a DoF and manager that suits that strategy

They have a great squad yes and it’s been built over the last decade and then slowly evolved. They are still not the biggest spenders over the last ten years. Second yes, but Arsenal and ourselves are also up there. So… It means when City spend £1 on a new player the output they get is much higher than everyone else. Why is that? 

Look at some of the recent purchases they have made. Cheap players that fits their squad with a clear role to play. Compare that to us, now and under Roman. No structure or strategy at all it seems. 

Edited April 29, 2023 by Sleeping Dave

[Ham]

26 minutes ago, Sleeping Dave said:

Great argument, if the spending thing was true. Which it isn’t. City hasn’t even been the biggest spenders over the last five season. In fact eight clubs have outspend them, nine if you count us and the insane splash we’ve done in 22/23. 

https://www.transfermarkt.com/premier-league/fuenfjahresvergleich/wettbewerb/GB1

Teams are certainly spending a lot of money, and more than City, to try to compete. The problem is that the money they spend isn’t utilised to the same effect. What City has done great is exactly what we should have done but lacked the competence to do;

- Build a new ground

- Secure a sound structure around the club

- Recruitment that fits their strategy 

- Clear strategy what type of football they want to play

- Get a DoF and manager that suits that strategy

They have a great squad yes and it’s been built over the last decade and then slowly evolved. They are still not the biggest spenders over the last ten years. Second yes, but Arsenal and ourselves are also up there. So… It means when City spend £1 on a new player the output they get is much higher than everyone else. Why is that? 

Look at some of the recent purchases they have made. Cheap players that fits their squad with a clear role to play. Compare that to us, now and under Roman. No structure or strategy at all it seems. 

City didn't build a new ground.  They got one handed to them on a plate from the city of Manchester. 

Plus, the most important part of their strategy was to fraudulently cook their books to exaggerate sponsorships.

 

 

[Sleeping Dave]

15 minutes ago, Ham said:

City didn't build a new ground.  They got one handed to them on a plate from the city of Manchester. 

Plus, the most important part of their strategy was to fraudulently cook their books to exaggerate sponsorships.

 

 

Well I suppose that is under scrutiny now and we will see what the outcome will be from that. But if they did indeed do all of those things, they only did it to circumvent FFP - something that was solely put in a place to protect the big clubs from rich newcomers. 

Im not sure I am ready to criticise Man C for sticking two fingers at UEFA/FIFA. At the same time, I think we (fans of Chelsea FC) realise what they have done right where we failed.