Chelsea 4 Leicester City 2

[Thiago97]

I think the thing with Sanchez / Petrovic is that Petrovic knows he is nothing special on the ball, so plays percentages. Whilst Sanchez has some ability on the ball, and has been encouraged to use that during his career. It’s a different mindset with both keepers.

The main issue with Sanchez in this scenario is a lack of urgency……but the other factor here is that playing out the back in this manner is very reliant on being pressed for it to achieve its maximum affect. Could it be the lack of urgency on the ball is entirely the purpose? For example , it you are passing early as a ball playing GK, then you are not taking any opponents momentarily of the game when pressed. Compared with delaying the pass until pressed, then you are creating more space and taking an opponent out of the game.

Not saying this in defence of Sanchez as such, as I think Petrovic should have the short right now. I’m just floating it out there that Sanchez has probably been encouraged to play in this manner during his career, he is regarded as a ball playing keeper and we have seen his long range passing to be very useful. I suspect the lack or urgency is entirely on purpose to draw players in, but right now he is creating too much panic playing this way. I suspect a lack of match sharpness probably puts more emphasis on this too, as he is probably not quite in the zone of playing out whilst being pressed with a match level intensity.

Edited March 19 by Thiago97

[Sciatika]

It's worth saying that even if Sanchez is the number two, we still have to play him from time to time in order to keep him match-ready. If we can't afford to do that, we need to consider replacing him in the longer term.

[Sciatika]

14 hours ago, ROTG said:

I believe they have won 1 in the past 5 matches in the championship, hence surrendering a 9 pts lead to Leeds 

And have had quite a few key players out with injury who are now returning. There is a loss of form rather than a decline. We will see at the end of the season. 

[Miguelito07]

1 hour ago, Sciatika said:

It's worth saying that even if Sanchez is the number two, we still have to play him from time to time in order to keep him match-ready. If we can't afford to do that, we need to consider replacing him in the longer term.

I agree. However, in the early rounds of the FA and Caribou cup - Pretovic didnt play - which was annoying

[east lower]

2 hours ago, xceleryx said:

It's somewhat reminiscent of how things turned under Mendy whenever we'd play back towards him. You could see the lack of confidence his defenders begun having when it came to having to use him as an outlet, and we're starting to see similar with Sanchez when he's played. Even though he is better technically than Mendy, he doesn't inspire a sense of security and calmness either. 

Moving forward I think it pays to be mindful that Sanchez arrived our number two and competition for Kepa, who had been deemed our first choice going into the season. So he did sign knowing a first team place wasn't necessarily a given. Now things changed once Kepa left and Sanchez through seniority got that starting role initially, however since being out Petrovic hasn't done anything to warrant being dropped. He's a calmer presence and while not perfect either, we surely have to stick with the option that's performing well and forged more trust with the defence. 

Clean sheets would certainly be a welcomed sight, but as you've said we've struggled defensively through both our own doing and just through not having our first choice options on hand either. Going into next season, whether TS remains or not, there's a hole at CB that I'd be looking to fill with some sort of commanding presence. It was pretty obvious we lacked size and power already, so to not address that in the summer would be a pretty alarming oversight IMO. 

Sanchez just seems to lack that 'imminent danger' sense and it's not just his own timing of the release of the ball - He'll pass it to someone who's in trouble themselves. Caicedo & Disasi have been recipients of this type of pass that then direcly led to an opposition goal.

I know the point that @Thiago97 makes with reference to drawing in a player towards you and then releasing the ball at near to, the last moment as it creates the maximum space in the 'hole' that they've left. Dare I say it, proper footballers (sorry to the 'keepers' reading that) have all the skill-sets to deal with this as they've been professionally coached their entire footballing lives. With goalkeepers the new ideal of the footballing goalkeeper is relatively new and some of them are 'learning on the job'. Sanchez I believe is one of those and doesn't yet (if he ever will) get the need to adjust his speed of thought and movement when the ball is at his feet. 

The other matter is that no matter which way you look at things, Disasi is not a defender that can operate with the ball at his feet in tight spaces. I quite like his attitude and some of his defending, I don't think he's your go-to-guy when playing out from the keeper. Which moves me onto, who do we need to buy-in to replace Silva and add experience. Gvardiol was supposed to be the new best CB, he's not thus far. The lad at Spuds, who came in in the January window was heralded as great, and all that happens when he plays is that they get beat. The art of defending at CB seems a bit of a lost art, they are all being coached to be Beckenbauer's, which alot of them aren't and will never be. I think we can get our right side sorted by playing Gusto & James. Perfect fit, one goes forward, one sits - they share the load and it might protect the fragile James from over-exertion?  Left-side looks OK with two options, but we need two 6ft 3" plus ball-attacking centre-halves and one big unit in centre-midfield to bully and compliment Caicedo, who just recently has started to be (Droyism) in the right places a lot of the time and is becoming more effective as a destroyer and initiator of passing movements.

[jasonb]

On 18/03/2024 at 10:39, CarefreeMuratcan said:

I'm over this draw fiasco now. Fact is we would need to beat City to win this Cup. Whether it's the Semi or the Final.

Considering fixture congestion and such, better to face them in the Semis.

True and we get more tickets too without the FA Cup top brass being there as is the case with the final.

[boratsbrother]

33 minutes ago, east lower said:

Sanchez just seems to lack that 'imminent danger' sense and it's not just his own timing of the release of the ball - He'll pass it to someone who's in trouble themselves. Caicedo & Disasi have been recipients of this type of pass that then direcly led to an opposition goal.

I know the point that @Thiago97 makes with reference to drawing in a player towards you and then releasing the ball at near to, the last moment as it creates the maximum space in the 'hole' that they've left. Dare I say it, proper footballers (sorry to the 'keepers' reading that) have all the skill-sets to deal with this as they've been professionally coached their entire footballing lives. With goalkeepers the new ideal of the footballing goalkeeper is relatively new and some of them are 'learning on the job'. Sanchez I believe is one of those and doesn't yet (if he ever will) get the need to adjust his speed of thought and movement when the ball is at his feet. 

The other matter is that no matter which way you look at things, Disasi is not a defender that can operate with the ball at his feet in tight spaces. I quite like his attitude and some of his defending, I don't think he's your go-to-guy when playing out from the keeper. Which moves me onto, who do we need to buy-in to replace Silva and add experience. Gvardiol was supposed to be the new best CB, he's not thus far. The lad at Spuds, who came in in the January window was heralded as great, and all that happens when he plays is that they get beat. The art of defending at CB seems a bit of a lost art, they are all being coached to be Beckenbauer's, which alot of them aren't and will never be. I think we can get our right side sorted by playing Gusto & James. Perfect fit, one goes forward, one sits - they share the load and it might protect the fragile James from over-exertion?  Left-side looks OK with two options, but we need two 6ft 3" plus ball-attacking centre-halves and one big unit in centre-midfield to bully and compliment Caicedo, who just recently has started to be (Droyism) in the right places a lot of the time and is becoming more effective as a destroyer and initiator of passing movements.

An experienced ( preferably not older than late 20') commanding CB is, imho, our number one priority this season! One that's a bit of a shouter and organiser will go a long way to improving our defence.

Not sure we need a big midfielder though. Pace and mobility is more important than size in that area.

 

[Bert19]

13 hours ago, paulw66 said:

I personally don't think there was anything wrong his positioning. I don't suppose Sanchez, who I'm not a fan of, thought Disasi would clobber the ball goalwards. I imagine he was expecting a nice gentle passback ....and if had, we wouldn't be having this conversation 

Kind of felt like the Goalie should have just been shouting "Get Rid!" from where I was sat above it.  

I think these sorts of errors are way more likely with this policy of everyone overplaying from the back.  Surrendering a throw-in there wouldn't have been a big issue in my opinion.  

13 hours ago, east lower said:

Just watched the OG back and if I were awarding percentage responsibility for that fiasco - Gusto gets 10%, Disasi gets 50% and Sanchez 40%.

Gusto puts Disasi into a pressure situation, Disasi panics and over hits the pass but WTAF is Sanchez doing out there.

Also the second half performance up to just before the sending off was sloppy, lazy and error ridden. Just as the stats show us to be after half-time. 

We asked that too.  

Given how bad we have been after half-time all season, i'm still pretty unimpressed that our manager planted his arse firmly into his seat after half-time and didn't stand up again until 2-3 mins after Leicester had equalised.  If that doesn't sum up some of the issue, I don't know what does.  It's clearly an issue that needs managing, so go and f-ing manage it! 

10 hours ago, xceleryx said:

Yeah, Sanchez is hard to trust. As a defender if you don't have confidence in going back to your keeper it makes things that much more difficult. He's just so slow when it comes to playing the ball, but also his decision making when playing out really puts us under additional pressure that's entirely avoidable.

As a number two he's reasonable enough, and in fairness he's a solid shot blocker. However, Petrovic has to be the clear first choice at present. He's just a far more calming figure. 

 

Sanchez just seems to take risks when he doesn't need to.  Invites pressure onto himself, makes surrendering possession in dangerous areas much more likely.  Petrovic has been a huge upgrade in that regard. 

But again, I feel like this lack of urgency and always playing out from the back is a coaching point - there should never be any issue with the goalie or defenders going long or just sending a ball out if they're unsure of their options.  Overplaying does cause problems - Sanchez found that out against Arsenal, it shouldn't be happening again and again. 

3 hours ago, Sciatika said:

It's worth saying that even if Sanchez is the number two, we still have to play him from time to time in order to keep him match-ready. If we can't afford to do that, we need to consider replacing him in the longer term.

Good point. 

[Bob Singleton]

18 hours ago, Mark Kelly said:

I suppose it would help if the coach told the players to close people down but that's beyond him apparently. Like stopping the cross coming in before it can do any damage. 

All roads lead to Poch. 

Playing Devil's Advocate here, as I'm no great fan of Poch, but not closing down players has been a Chelsea problem going back many, many seasons now. One example... Eriksen scoring from outside the area in his Spurs days.  Poch is currently to blame because he's in charge now, but let's not pretend it hasn't been an on-going problem.

[Sciatika]

Alfie Gilchrist needs a loan to someone who is going to play him regularly either at home or abroad.

[east lower]

3 hours ago, boratsbrother said:

An experienced ( preferably not older than late 20') commanding CB is, imho, our number one priority this season! One that's a bit of a shouter and organiser will go a long way to improving our defence.

I agree, the question is who?

An older PL experienced head perhaps and I hate to say anyone else coming in from that South Coast bunch of bandits - But a Lewis Dunk type character might be just the job until one of the existing fella's come throough (looks unlikely on what we've seen to date) or we find a gem?

3 hours ago, boratsbrother said:

 

Not sure we need a big midfielder though. Pace and mobility is more important than size in that area.

 

Not being rude, tell that to Rodri at Man City 😉

Get the right man and they'll dominate games, just as the above named does.

Agree, that the 'vogue' seems to be the 5ft10' to 6ft ish types, but we'll not win much with Caicedo and Fernandez in the centre of our midfield - And I'm warming to Caicedo as the season goes on.

[CarefreeMuratcan]

3 hours ago, jasonb said:

True and we get more tickets too without the FA Cup top brass being there as is the case with the final.

Literally just texted the exact same thing to my Dad.

[Thiago97]

1 hour ago, east lower said:

I agree, the question is who?

An older PL experienced head perhaps and I hate to say anyone else coming in from that South Coast bunch of bandits - But a Lewis Dunk type character might be just the job until one of the existing fella's come throough (looks unlikely on what we've seen to date) or we find a gem?

Not being rude, tell that to Rodri at Man City 😉

Get the right man and they'll dominate games, just as the above named does.

Agree, that the 'vogue' seems to be the 5ft10' to 6ft ish types, but we'll not win much with Caicedo and Fernandez in the centre of our midfield - And I'm warming to Caicedo as the season goes on.

Yeah I agree. It needs to be a Dunk type character and leader . He has probably missed the boat a little now at 32, we could do with 3-4 years younger ideally. 
It’s a spine of the team job for me. A physical ball playing centre half, a physical CM who knows and understands his position and a quality Striker.  Ideally, all experienced and with leadership qualities ranging from 26-30 

Whilst he doesn’t quite fit the metric I set out. I like Guehi the more I watch him, I was a fan when he was here, but he has grown into a quality CB in the last 3 seasons. I would be quite happy to have him back 

Edited March 19 by Thiago97

[east lower]

2 hours ago, Thiago97 said:

Yeah I agree. It needs to be a Dunk type character and leader . He has probably missed the boat a little now at 32, we could do with 3-4 years younger ideally. 
It’s a spine of the team job for me. A physical ball playing centre half, a physical CM who knows and understands his position and a quality Striker.  Ideally, all experienced and with leadership qualities ranging from 26-30 

Whilst he doesn’t quite fit the metric I set out. I like Guehi the more I watch him, I was a fan when he was here, but he has grown into a quality CB in the last 3 seasons. I would be quite happy to have him back 

Guehi, in my view just isn’t tall or big enough to be a top-class centre-half. The best ones are 6ft3” plus these days. He’s just under 6ft. 

The fella at Man Utd is the only one I can think of who’s under 6ft but I wouldn’t judge him as in the elite bracket. Good footballer with a knack of being in the right spot.

The problem is there’s not many established and proven CB’s that would be available, semi-affordable and would want to come to us. That’s why I might go for a Dunk or similar. CB’s can play to 34/35 without losing too much physically.

 

[Sleeping Dave]

Are we seriously talking about buying yet another CB after having spend €45m on Disasi, €80m on Fofana, and Badiashile €40m? 

We have far more pressing issues imo.

[east lower]

46 minutes ago, Sleeping Dave said:

Are we seriously talking about buying yet another CB after having spend €45m on Disasi, €80m on Fofana, and Badiashile €40m? 

We have far more pressing issues imo.

Don’t know if the club are, but we can’t keep clean sheets and seeing a need to score at least 3 goals a game to win them. And 3 goals a game against Championship sides, albeit the top two teams in that league.

[kev61]

19 hours ago, Sciatika said:

It's worth saying that even if Sanchez is the number two, we still have to play him from time to time in order to keep him match-ready. If we can't afford to do that, we need to consider replacing him in the longer term.

I just watched the replay of the Leicester game - I never got the chance match day to watch it.

Sanchez is a disaster waiting to happen - I understand not moth balling him but good God he is awful.

I have mixed views on Sterling.He gets into really good positions but his decision making is off the scale bad.

He wasn't worth the money, so we need to get a decent price for him - If we can't then he still has a part to play 

[ROTG]

1 hour ago, kev61 said:

He wasn't worth the money, so we need to get a decent price for him - If we can't then he still has a part to play 

There is probably 50/60% of the squad who were not worth the money paid for them and were given 8 year pensions 

yet one again an established international is the easy option to sledge. 
 

I dread to think what kind of comments would be make if the club decided to buy international class senior players “which I doubt” and they have a bad game. 
 

I wonder when TT and TB we’re trying sign sterling,  they said to him, that within two months we will sack the manager and replace him with a nobody, and in the next transfer window we will start pumping senior international players, in favour of the owners ego signings and some unknowns from various leagues, and next summer transfer window, the club will pump all the senior players, and bring in levels of players which our scouts had identified or were playing for their previous mid table clubs?

It’s a funny old game. 

[kev61]

22 hours ago, Thiago97 said:

I think the thing with Sanchez / Petrovic is that Petrovic knows he is nothing special on the ball, so plays percentages. Whilst Sanchez has some ability on the ball, and has been encouraged to use that during his career. It’s a different mindset with both keepers.

The main issue with Sanchez in this scenario is a lack of urgency……but the other factor here is that playing out the back in this manner is very reliant on being pressed for it to achieve its maximum affect. Could it be the lack of urgency on the ball is entirely the purpose? For example , it you are passing early as a ball playing GK, then you are not taking any opponents momentarily of the game when pressed. Compared with delaying the pass until pressed, then you are creating more space and taking an opponent out of the game.

Not saying this in defence of Sanchez as such, as I think Petrovic should have the short right now. I’m just floating it out there that Sanchez has probably been encouraged to play in this manner during his career, he is regarded as a ball playing keeper and we have seen his long range passing to be very useful. I suspect the lack or urgency is entirely on purpose to draw players in, but right now he is creating too much panic playing this way. I suspect a lack of match sharpness probably puts more emphasis on this too, as he is probably not quite in the zone of playing out whilst being pressed with a match level intensity.

I reckon you are competing with Celery for most waffle spoken by a member. 

[Thiago97]

45 minutes ago, kev61 said:

I reckon you are competing with Celery for most waffle spoken by a member. 

Trust me when I say this mate. If you are calling it waffle, that is very much a compliment I my eyes 👍

[Sciatika]

3 hours ago, kev61 said:

Sanchez is a disaster waiting to happen - I understand not moth balling him but good God he is awful.

Maybe so. In his defence, I think he is suffering from the same problem as some of our other players, which is that the lack of confidence is causing him to try too hard. He keeps trying to dominate his area by coming for balls he has no chance of reaching. and this means he tends to flap at it ineffectively. He drifts forward to act as a sweeper-keeper, but before the ball is sufficiently clear of the defensive zone,  which means he is not where the defenders expect him to be. That lack of confidence also means that he focuses on the skills that he feels are his strengths, as @Morgs pointed out a few days ago. Consequently, he has adopted a tendency to dwell on the ball, even at the risk of losing it. What he needs to do is go back to basics. Clear the ball early and decisively if no pass is available. Variation is a strength. If you cannot reach the ball, leave it to the defence and be ready for the second ball.  And so on.  

I think Sterling has the same problem. He desperately wants goals to validate his position int he team (as well as him a potential candidate for the Summer Euros). It ends up with him not passing to a player with a better chance or wanting to take the free-kicks and penalties.

[boratsbrother]

2 hours ago, ROTG said:

There is probably 50/60% of the squad who were not worth the money paid for them and were given 8 year pensions 

yet one again an established international is the easy option to sledge. 
 

I dread to think what kind of comments would be make if the club decided to buy international class senior players “which I doubt” and they have a bad game. 
 

I wonder when TT and TB we’re trying sign sterling,  they said to him, that within two months we will sack the manager and replace him with a nobody, and in the next transfer window we will start pumping senior international players, in favour of the owners ego signings and some unknowns from various leagues, and next summer transfer window, the club will pump all the senior players, and bring in levels of players which our scouts had identified or were playing for their previous mid table clubs?

It’s a funny old game. 

There's a big difference between the Sterling and our young players.

Sterling is clearly a player past his peak and is only going to get worse the onger  we keep him. He is being paid massive wages but at £1 million per league goal scored he has been another hugely overpaid flop,! His performances for us  are whats important, not his  experience and what he did eleswhere! It would be crazy to keep wasting £300k a week on a such a bang average player in decline. Getting that wage off the books and maybe £30m for him would be very good business for is this summer!

At the other end,  our young players were clearly not bought because of their experience and record over the years. They were bought for their potential to grow into quality players and help make a new team which could be together for the next decade. Most, if not all of them will be on fraction of Sterling's salary. They all have potential to get better and better, not worse and worse. Already in his limited appearances, Chuck has shown levels of techincal ability and quick football brain that's beetrr than anything Sterling has shown for us. Palmer is  already light years ahead of Sterling. Gusto has been one of our best players, so too Gallagher. Jackson scoring more. 

This is nothing personal against Sterling. It's simply about him not producing anywhere near enough for the money he's being paid.

 

 

[boratsbrother]

11 hours ago, east lower said:

Don’t know if the club are, but we can’t keep clean sheets and seeing a need to score at least 3 goals a game to win them. And 3 goals a game against Championship sides, albeit the top two teams in that league.

But last season, such was the dire lack of creativity and goal threat, we were crapping the bed whenever any team of any quality scored a single goal against us.  

I think sorting out our defence will be an easier problem to fix than  the lack of goals and creativity which has been a problem for years. 

 

[Mark Kelly]

39 minutes ago, Sciatika said:

 

I think Sterling has the same problem. He desperately wants goals to validate his position int he team (as well as him a potential candidate for the Summer Euros). It ends up with him not passing to a player with a better chance or wanting to take the free-kicks and penalties.

My  thoughts entirely , I honestly think Pochettino should be sitting Sterling down and explaining that he has nothing to prove here and he would be serving the team just as well by assisting his team mates and leading by example and not trying to take charge of every situation and win it for Sterling FC  to impress an idiot international coach .

[chiswickblue]

1 hour ago, boratsbrother said:

But last season, such was the dire lack of creativity and goal threat, we were crapping the bed whenever any team of any quality scored a single goal against us.  

I think sorting out our defence will be an easier problem to fix than  the lack of goals and creativity which has been a problem for years. 

 

I think being able to give a back 4 + GK a run of games together, plus possibly a more physical presence in front of them in midfield to help out Caicedo would help. Ugochukwa and Lavia haven't had much of a chance yet, having them fit could make a difference or a more experienced player may be necessary.