Back to Winning Ways!! Match Report: Chelsea 3 Wolves 0

A relatively comfortable 3-0 win ensured that the recent pressure piled upon Andre-Villas Boas was eased, having prevented another home defeat which quite frankly would have led to the media hanging AVB out to dry.

Chelsea went into the weekend’s match knowing that only a win would be sufficient enough to boost confidence levels having suffered a recent dip in form with back to back defeats.  The opponents came in the shape of a Wolves side, who themselves have not enjoyed a particularly good start to the season, having picked up only 11 points from the first 13 games of the season so far.

AVB made a few changes to the side that had lost to Liverpool the previous weekend. Mikel, Lampard and Malouda all dropped to the bench and in their place, in came Romeu, Merieles and Sturridge.  Dropping Lampard to the bench was a bold move by AVB, but one must not be drawn into assuming that Frank is no longer a guaranteed starter.  The good thing about AVB’s approach to managing Chelsea is that he is not afraid to make changes when deemed necessary for the team to get the right results!  As with the Liverpool match there was again no place for Torres in the starting line up, with the manager instead opting for a front line of Mata, Drogba and an in form Sturridge.  Ashley Cole was also back in the side, having been out for the trip to Leverkusen in the Champions League.  Anelka was not even in the squad, and it now looks increasingly likely that he may be seeking pastures new sooner rather than later, with the January transfer window in sight!

With Chelsea determined to put their recent ‘bad moment’ behind them, the signs were good from early on in the game.  Chelsea pushed forward, with Ramires showing signs of the quality player that he has been for us this season.  An attack by Ramires a.k.a. the Duracell Bunny was blocked by the Wolves keeper and led to a corner kick being awarded to Chelsea.  This subsequently led to Chelsea’s first goal, with none other than Mr Chelsea, John Terry heading home in the bottom corner of Hennessey’s goal just 7 minutes into the match.  With the home side already 1-0 up, early on in the game, it had an arousing effect on the crowd.  This early goal certainly opened it up for Chelsea to build from there and seek more goals.  Just one goal was not going to be enough for the home side to settle down.  In recent outings, against Bayer Leverkusen and the home defeat to Liverpool, the downfall had been sloppy defending leading to late goals for the opposition.  It seemed that on Saturday, the defence was a bit more solid, perhaps with the change in personnel proving to be of benefit, with Romeu sitting comfortably in his position in front of the back four.  However, Chelsea were not going to just sit back and defend, and were determined to push forward as much as possible.

The choice of Mata, Drogba and Sturridge seemed to be a good choice, with the men up front constantly causing problems for Wolves’ defence. Mata has been a good addition to the team, while Sturridge has come back to us, with a beneficial period on loan at Bolton at the end of last season certainly having helped him to develop his game.  Ramires, Merieles and Mata were all key to causing Wolves problems on Saturday afternoon, and it was not long before the Chelsea faithful saw the ball go into the back of the net again for the second goal. It was in the 29^th minute when Juan Mata went past Zubar, and then set up Daniel Sturridge to neatly finish off and give the blues a 2-0 lead.  Following on from that, although Wolves made a change as a reaction to conceding a second goal, this was no prevail as shortly before half time Mata neatly finished off a cross from the fit again Ashley Cole to make it 3-0.  As half time arrived the game already seemed to be done and dusted!!

After half time, although Chelsea did push forward and did have a fair few chances to increase the lead, the ball did not find the back of the net.  Wolves did keep a tighter defence for the second half, however, going forward Wolves were not creating the chances that Chelsea were.  With the last quarter of an hour to go AVB brought on both Lampard and Torres.  Just like the match with Liverpool, Torres was brought on too late to make much of an impact, however with the score at 3-0 in Chelsea’s favour it did not matter much.  With Torres, however, personally I would have liked to have seen him get some more time on the pitch, as he can only improve and gain confidence simply my playing more.  If he had come on shortly after half time, with the score already at 3-0, perhaps it would have given him more of an opportunity to shine.  Saying that however, I have complete faith in AVB, and as long as we get the results, I don’t care who is on the pitch, as long as they have the blue shirt on and are performing.

In the end, the second half did not see any more goals to add to the first half goals, and the final score was 3-0 to Chelsea.  When the final whistle went, and once the 3 points as well as a clean sheet had been secured there was a sense of relief all around Stamford Bridge, for each and every individual inside the stadium, except of course the visiting side and travelling supporters.  The day was made even better in the knowledge that Manchester United had dropped points with a home draw against Newcastle. Unfortunately however, Spurs did not drop any points away to Wigan, but with our win we took one step to closing the gap on the teams above us.  The season is yet to reach the half way stage, and if we continue to build on the confident win on Saturday we can pile pressure on those above us in the league.

Roll on Liverpool in the Carling Cup on Tuesday, followed by the long trip up to Newcastle next weekend!

Win or lose, up the blues!!

Team Line ups:
Chelsea (4-3-3): Cech; Ivanovic (Bosingwa), Luiz, Terry, Cole; Romeu, Ramires, Meireles (Lampard); Mata, Drogba (Torres), Sturridge

Wolves (4-5-1): Hennessey; Zubar (Forde), Johnson, Berra, Elokobi; Jarvis, Edwards, Henry, Milijas (Ebanks-Blake), Ward; Fletcher (Guedioura).

Attendence: 41, 648

My Man of the Match: Daniel Sturridge – He was lively throughout the 90 minutes and he is in good form at the moment!!

SUPER...SUPER FRANK!

'Lampard is finished'.....'Lampard is no longer first team material for Chelsea or England'......' Fat Frank has lost it'.....'Lampard storms off after Swansea snub'.......These are just some of the b******t things that you may have been fed from the dimwits in the media as well as many individuals that have done nothing but criticise Frank for far too long, most notably after his recent exclusion in the home match against Swansea last week. However, the fact of the matter is Frank is a hard working individual, always giving 100% for the team, and when he has been faced with the harsh criticism, like recent times, how does he shut his critics up??.......The answer is by doing all the talking on the pitch and scoring 4 goals in the two games!! Yes thats right- the same Frank Lampard that is supposedly past his best and apparently cannot score, has just shown why critics do so at their own peril!!

His performance at Bolton, was certainly a top class performance, and by scoring a hat-trick along with his performance, he has simply put all his doubters in place and hopefully shut them up. However, be under no illusion, due to the bias nature of the media, it is very likely that the morning papers will focus more on how poor Bolton were rather than the performance by Lampard and the rest of the team in securing a 5-1 win. Lampard has, and in my opinion continue to be and integral part of the Chelsea team.  One can never forget the momentous day on 30th April 2005 (click here for clip of epic day in 2005), when he was responsible for sealing the first title win for us in 50 years.  For many, like myself who were not born in our previous title win in 1955, this title in 2005 will always hold fond memories.  Of course as Chelsea supporters, it is a day that we will cherish for years to come, and will always remember the part super Frank played in it. Yes, whilst it is true,that everyone ages, and with age performance can drop in many players, however there is no one as hard working as Frank, and he has without a doubt been the fittest and most consistent player in the team for the past decade.  Personally I think too much has been made about his exclusion last week against Swansea.  With games coming in thick and fast, AVB is wise enough to rotate the squad to keep the players fresh and ensure a top level performance.  Lampard isn't one to sulk and give up.  His answer is to work hard and fight for his place.  His hard work has certainly paid off and was evident at the Reebok Stadium.      

Super Frank celebrates the goal that sealed his hat-trick at the Reebok Stadium

Aside from Frank, the performance of the team in general has been improving over the past few games, and AVB's side seem to be gelling together.  I am not going to talk too much about the Bolton match, but one thing to take home from the game is the fact that another player that seems to be doing particularly well is Sturridge.  His loan spell at the Reebok stadium has done him good, and the young English striker is now stepping up to the mark.  With so many members of the squad improving as the games go on including Sturridge, healthy competition for places can only be a positive thing.  Danny has certainly been improving and it was good to see him get a couple of goals this weekend to add to the one he had up at Sunderland last month.  The only disappointment, is that astonishingly 'Crapello' has opted for Andy Carrol instead of Sturridge for the upcoming England game.  I would have thought that Danny has done enough to be in the England side but obviously Fabio Capello does not see that.  Nevermind, I am sure he will get a place in the England senior side very soon.    Anyway coming back to Chelsea, there are definitely promising things to come from this side, and without a doubt Sturridge and Lampard will have big parts to play this season.

So until next time keep the blue flag flying high! UTC!!!!

     

Taking the positives out of defeat

Well, so just as we had done in our previous two visits to Old Trafford at the tail end of last season we came away with defeat.  However, despite losing 3-1 it certainly does not feel like we have lost.  Whilst we may have fallen on the wrong side of the scoreline, our overall performance was decent. Perhaps we deserved to come away with at least a point, but the key factor in our defeat has to lie in the inability of us capitalising on the numerous chances we had while United finished off with the few chances they had to get their 3 goals.Football is a game that often relies on luck, and it is something we just didn't have today. 

I thought that we played reasonably well today and if we forget the result and just look at are overall performance we certainly will have a lot to look forward to for the rest of this season.  The only complaints that you can have is the fact that we failed to finish off good chances to find the back of the net, most notably the chance Ramires had in the first half and of course the sitter that Fernando missed in the second half that would have made the score 3-2 at that point in the game.  However, despite the shocker of a miss that is sure to make the back page headlines tommorow morning, I thought Torres had a good game and over the last few games he seems to be recapturing the form that promted Roman to part with £50 m back in January.  It was an interesting change that AVB made at half time when Anelka was brought on for Lampard, but this worked almost immediately as we increased the presence in attack, leading to Fernando's goal just after HT. On another day Fernando would have got a few goals, but it is good to see that he is improving and finding his form now, and I think that the new look squad with the likes of Merieles and Mata have a part to play in that.

I must say the feeling of defeat at Old Trafford is rather different from last season as there is a sense of optimism.  I have complete faith in what AVB is doing and judging by performance alone we should have a lot more to look forward to this season as we are still improving day by day.  Therefore, the overall picture does seem positive and we shouldn't worry too much about the loss.....after all it is still early days.  We will see who has the last laugh in May.....

Until then just keep the blue flag flying high!

Win or lose ....up the blues!

Who the f*** are man united??!

It has been a while since my last blog post, but here I am writing ahead of our trip to Old Trafford on Sunday.  It is a trip to the same ground which effectively ended our season in terms of both the Champions League and the Premier League, at the tail end of last season.  However this time we  face them 5 games into the new campaign, which I believe is good for us in the long run.  It is always an advantage to get a challengeing away day out of the way early on in the season, but one must not give in the the mass media hype over the 'exceptional' start that United have made to the season.  It seems as though we have already been classed as underdogs this season, with an awful lot of fuss being made over both Manchester teams. Yes, although it seems that they have started like a house on fire this season, one must not draw conclusions for the rest of the season purely from the first couple of games. Take for example the start of last season; we started with exceptional 6-0 and 4-0 wins, and some people were confident that the title was already headed to Stamford Bridge.  However, we all know that it wasn't to last long, as in spectacular fashion we faltered so badly with poor mid-season form that it effectively handed the title to United.  In other words only he who is a fool would already start drawing conclusions on how the season will end.  

So, whilst it is true that United, and also Citeh for that matter have made a good start to the season and may seem favourites in the eyes of the biased media, we will happily take the underdogs tag for this season's title race.  Ok, so far our start to the season hasn't been amazing, especially in comparison to last season's start, however, we have been getting the result and that's what matters.  Whilst United have been causing the media to get off on their large wins over the likes of mediocre opponents such as 5-0 against Bolton and a pathetic Arsenal side 8-2, we have been quietly grinding out our wins, with the exception of our opponing day draw at Stoke. At the end of the day, it is just getting the results that counts, and believe me we will improve as the season goes on as we are still finding out feet with a new look squad under AVB.  United on the other hand, may possibly run out of steam too early just as we did last year.  I think that whilst United are favourites, our squad definatley has the depth to challenge United and come Sunday at Old Trafford we are more than capable of getting a result.  AVB will ensure that the team are full of confidence ahead of the encounter and I have full faith that he will go all out to ensure we go for nothing but a win.  On Sunday we will see whether we come away with the 3 points or not, but one thing is for sure, we shouldn't fear them because we can definately match them and are capable.  A good start to the game will be key, and hopefully we will have that.

COME ON CHELSEA!

KTBFFH

Kunal Sapat (Chelsea Boy @SW17ChelseaSG) 

 

Welcome back Di Matteo!!

This morning Andre Villas Boas was officially unveiled as Chelsea's manager in a press conference, in which he also revealed his backroom staff.  The most notable addition to coaching staff is that of Roberto Di Matteo.  The former West Brom manager, a Chelsea legend will be returning to the club as AVB's assistant.  On hearing this news, I was quite pleased and I am sure that this will be the start of an exciting era for Chelsea. 

Di Matteo, spent a six year period playing in the blue shirt, before his early retirement due to injury in 2002 at the age of just 31.  He is most notably remembered from his playing career at Chelsea for his cup final goals.  As Chelsea supporters we can never forget his record breaking goal in just 43 seconds at the old Wembley in the 1997 FA Cup final, which helped us win our first trophy after many years.  Follwing on from that he also scored in the 1998 Coca-Cola Cup final (League cup) and scored the last ever cup final goal at the old wembley in the 2000 FA Cup final.  Unfortunately he had to retire early due to injury, but since then he has tried his hand at coaching and football management. 

Di Matteo started his managerial career at MK Dons, and after doing a decent job for them he was appointed West Brom's manager in 2009.  He led them to promotion to the premier league in just his first season in charge after finishing second place in the Championship.  However, he was sacked from as West Brom manager halfway through the 2010/2011 season, as the club were not happy with the performances.  However, in my view I think he did a very good job at West Brom by getting them promoted and by putting on decent performances in their first season back in the Premier League.  It is in my view that perhaps his sacking as West Brom manager was not justifiable.  However, what's done is done, and everything happens for a reason, and it is for this reason that we can welcome him back to Stamford Bridge!

In August 2010, when he returned to Stamford Bridge as West Brom's manager we would never have even imaged that he would reurn to work at Chelsea within a year.  At that time, we were still on top of the world after our double winning season and we wouldnt have even thought Carlo would be gone come what May, let alone Di Matteo returning as coach.  I believe that he will prove pivotal for success in the AVB era, and we can look forward to a promising season at Chelsea.  I for one was glad Di Matteo being given assistant role, rather than Emenalo being given that title.  However, I have a feeling Emenalo will still stay at the club under some capacity.  Additonaly, Steve Holland, the successful reserve team coach has been promoted to first team coach at Chelsea.

AVB has reinterated that it will not be a one man show, and it will be a group effort to bring success at Chelsea, and he is certianly right about that.  We have got the right people now in charge of the team, and I am certainly looking forward to the new season!

UP THE CHELS!

The Andre Villas Boas era begins!

After much speculation over the last few weeks, and after Andre-Villas Boas's resignation as Porto manager yesterday, he has been appointed as Chelsea's new manager.  This morning, an official club statement on the website said the following:

"Chelsea Football Club is delighted to announce that Andre Villas-Boas will be the club's new manager.

He has signed a three-year contract and will start work immediately.

Andre was the outstanding candidate for the job. He is one of the most talented young managers in football today and has already achieved much in a relatively short space of time. His ambition, drive and determination matches that of Chelsea and we are confident Andre's leadership of the team will result in greater successes in major domestic and European competitions.

Andre will bring his coaching experience back to a club he is already very familiar with, having previously worked here for three years. He has always been highly regarded at Chelsea and everyone here looks forward to welcoming him back and working with him."

At just 33, Andre Villas Boas becomes one of our youngest ever managers, and at the start of the season he will be the same age as both Drogba and Lampard.  In what is his second spell at the club, having previously worked under Mourinho as a scout, he joins after a hugely successful season with Porto, having won the treble in his first full year of management.  AVB is one of the brightest  prospects in football management, and hopefully he will be the right man to lead us to success both domestically and in Europe!

Comparisons have been made between AVB and Mourinho, which is hardly suprising as AVB learnt his trade under the guidence of Jose before taking his own posts in mangement.  However, Andre has been successfull in his own right, and despite him being dubbed the new Mourinho, we should move away from that as I am sure AVB will bring his own style of play and success which was evident at Porto.    


Could he be our 'new special one' ?.....who knows, but it is sure to be an exciting season!

Now that we finally have a manager in place, we need to get active in the transfer market and start preparing for next season, which pre season only 3 weeks away.  Roll on next season!


Welcome back to Chelsea Andre Villas Boas!!   

It all begins at the Britannia Stadium!

This morning the fixture list for the 2011/2012 season was released, and the countdown to next season begins now!  JT and the boys begin the season with a tough match away to Stoke on the opening day on 13th August.  This is followed by two home games against West Brom and newly promoted Norwich.  With our first few home games we will be looking to gain maximum points and will be hoping for a repeat of last season's opening day win over West Brom when we put six goals past the Baggies.

Our first big test of the season comes early on, with a trip to Old Trafford in September and this time round we will be looking to avenge our defeats at the tail end of last season, with the return fixture at Stamford Bridge in February.  Trips to newly promoted Norwich and Swansea come back to back in January, and personally I am looking forward to these as they will be new away trips for this season.    

The season comes to an end at home to Blackburn, when we will be hoping to see JT lift the title again, following on from a trip to Anfield in the penultimate game of the season.  This  has echos of the 2009/2010 when we all but won the title in the historic double winning season with a victory at Anfield in the second last game of the season.  If we do the same in May 2012, it will certainly be a good end to the season.

Our managerial situation may still not have been resolved, but with the release of the fixtures, we can safely say that the excitement for next season has begun.  Regardless of whatever outcome there is to next season, we are all eager for it to get started, and it is safe to say that in two months time we will be back in our blue shirts, in our usual pre-match boozers down the Fulham Road and in our seats at Stamford Bridge!

Roll on next season :)

For those of you that want to look the part for next season, the SW17 Chelsea Supporters Group T-Shirts will be available soon, for more information visit our facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/SW17ChelseaSG