I would take the Daily Fail with a pinch of salt, nothing but conjecture.

Yep.

Not that we shouldn't be looking for a CB anyway. Good luck to anyone trying to find one right now....

Schwarzer; Azpilicueta, Luiz, JT (c), Bertrand; Essien, Mikel; Moses, De Bruyne, Schurrle; Torres

Blackman, Ivanovic, Cole, Cahill Ramires, Lampard, Oscar, Van Ginkel, Hazard, Lukaku

Shocker from Schwarzer

Pretty funny....good thing it's a friendly.

Good cure for insomnia so far. Some of the players might as well be asleep. Hopefully JM will shake things up a bit at half-time.

Ba, Lampard, Ramires and Oscar on. Should see some improvement now....now that it'd take much.

2-1 in the end then. Decent goal from Frank, and good to see Lukaku on the scoresheet again. Hopefully he can continue his scoring form into the season.

We had 2 strikers on the pitch. At the same time. Both playing up-front.

Welcome back, Jose

Lukaku has done enough pre-season to be the striker who starts the season.

I hope Jose picks him over torres.

As long as we select players on their form and fitness I'm not too worried about the combination.
I'm just looking foward to us not having someone who "must" play, game after game, regardless of their contribution.

I agree. No player should be guaranteed a starting place.

Cannot wait for the season to start. What are the predictions for 2014/14?

I would be happy with top 2 finish, good CL run and a cup.

As long as we single points off the title I will be happy. Not bothered if we come 2nd or 3rd (little difference between the two places) as long as its only a couple of points difference.

We have become a cup team lately and with the money we have spent etc, We should have been at least challenging for titles.

Am not knocking the cups but for teams like City,Utd and Chelsea cups should be a bonus and not at the expense of fighting for the title until the last week or so of the league.

I honestly think we wrote last season off - too many players leaving and coming into the side. Here is the champions league winning team of one season ago:

Cech
Bosingwa Cahill Luiz Cole
Mikkel Lampard
Kalou Mata Bertrand
Drogba

(Subs: Ferreira, Turnbull, Essien, Romeu, Malouda, Sturridge, Torres)

It was a major change, how many of those players have now left the club or are not 1st team players?

Qualifying for the CL and winning the Uefa/ Europa League was a result with our "new" team.

This season i expect them to kick on, and i think they will. We seem to have real quality and a depth of people on the bench who can affect the game. Of course, signing Rooney would be a major addition.

We have "written off" to many seasons. And the "major change" excuse is another old one. Utd make major changes every couple of years but does not mean they drop out the title hunt. FFS we dropped out of the top 4 (alot more heads should have rolled because of that) and was very lucky to finish 3rd this season. None of that is good enough with the tools the people at the club have had to use.

Just like the Champions League win pappered over the cracks at Liverpool, Its done the same at Chelsea.

We have had 10 years of Romans ownership and we are still not where we should be with regards to leagues won and the level of players at the club, Yes we seeing those players coming now but if we had used our tools in the correct way we would have had them 5 years ago.

At the moment after 10 years of Roman investement we should be years ahead of where City (no matter what they spend) are but because we keep making major changes and allowing lots of players to come and go at the same time we are not. This is the entire fault of the Board, people like Gouley, Buck and Emenalo who have coasted along due to lack of any team (until City came along) being able to sort themselves out to challenge us and Utd.

Hopefully this is all changing now and we have finally let our lessons that the last 10 years have taught us. I have my doubts as the 3 stoodges are still there.

Why do you say that so much when you get the replies every time?

I agree almost entirely. I know it sounds conceited but teams like Chelsea shouldn't need seasons "in transition". If I was Abramovich, and had spent approaching a £billion on players, it would make me furious to hear the expression.
Of course. It's partly his own fault. Abramovich insisted on bringing in Shevchenko, which was probably the start of the bust-up with Mourinho. We had a fantastic squad, and we were breaking Premiership records. We should have been able to go from strength to strength, just as the other other major sides in Europe were doing. Instead we made no attempt at stability, managers came and went, the entire team grew older, then we bought Torres and wasted another two seasons trying to build a team around a failing player.
Only one side can win The Champions League every year, so we should have been more patient back in 2008..t's not as if we weren't getting close anyway. It's ironic that we finally won it with a much weaker side, playing backs-to- the-wall football, not exactly what Roman had in mind.

The club (and alot of fans I have to say) got obbessed with the winning the Champions League because they thought it would mean we was eating at the top table of football teams. Well it did not and never was going to the way we went about it. Gouley got a hard on about the money it would bring in and the shirts he could sell and the money he could charge for companies to sell their dish water that they call beer at the Bridge. We needed long term planning we got caught up with the wanting something NOW that we see everywhere now attutude,

Yes while people can say "Hazzard etcjoined Chelsea because of the Champions League win" but those players still would have joined Chelsea if we won the title another 2/3 times which is something we should have been able to do.

We must remember how close we was to folding when Roman bought us, We lost that game agaisnt Liverpool and Lamps would have been let go off, JT sold to god knows who and us as fans would be going away games to watch Northwich Vics. We was given a massive foot up but instead of saying right lets stablise where we are and build on it, We tried to jump 10 places again. Yes Roman has to take alot of blame but those in day to the day to day running of the club have got to take the blame as well,

They have fantastic resources at their fingertips but have lacked the abilty to use them in a manor that means you move forwards at a right pace for the club and it satisfy the owner at same time, Not a easy job I admit but when you running a club like Chelsea you need to be the very best in your field so should be something they can do

That's all true, but Roman didn't come with that perspective. He might be coming round to that view, 10 years and a billion quid later. We are definitely looking at a more long term strategy now with our buys and hopefully the days of getting stung on every single purchase are over. Emenalo is doing a good job. Courtois, de Bruyne, Wallace, Traore, van Ginkel, Moses and even Cahill look decent and will hopefully increase in value with us. We're also becoming more of a team rather than a bunch of stars (Rooney arriving might upset that so I wouldn't be too upset if we missed out on him).
I would love a nice long period of stability and building while still winning things, but saying all that, I'd still take the past 10 years as they've been the most successful I've ever known as a Chelsea fan and I'm grateful to Roman even if I would had done some things differently.

Hopefully Abramovich has got his inner football manager under control now. The Schevchenko and Torres purchases contributed to losing Mourinho and Ancelotti (especially harsh). I'm warming to Emenalo from our recent purchases and hope he works well with Jose. Roman seems to trust him and if they all cooperate and don't get in each others way, we could have some stability.

I am and if it ends next week will always be greatful to Roman for the last 10 years and dont blame him for all the issues, Yes he made the choices but I think if we had different people in charge they might have been able to handle him better.

I actually think the Rooney signing if it comes off could be massive, He just the sort of player we need (and should have bought years ago), He is a football buy yes a big name which helps but unlike with some of our striker buys is not due just to his name value, He could be key to us acutally building something, His value for me has always been his abilty to make others player jobs simple, Some of his best and most important work is done when he dont have the ball,

Our prevous attemepts at buying strikers have been about finding someone to score "35 goals a season", even if they dont suit our style or the players around him With the team we have now and the way I think Jose will want to play he could be the key to us doing THE double one season. We wont see it sorted until after the Utd game anyway but then I hope we just put in the 30 million pound bid and get it sorted

I like Rooney most of the time, but I'm not sure we need the upheaval. We couldn't justify his wages as I doubt he'll contribute twice as much as Hazard, Mata or any of the starting 11. He is definitely more adaptable than Torres and wouldn't need babysitting, but I don't see him as a value purchase at a time when we've just started to buy smart.

Hazzard and Mata are fantastic players but in Rooney i see the key to turning them in to "World Class" standard players, Yes they more then likely could do that themselfs but sometimes you need someone to do the leg work and for me Rooney is that type of player, Wages wont be a problem due to the fact he will bring in money though being English,Our number 1 striker etc, But instead of being a highly paid and big money striker bought because of his name when he dont fit the team, He might not contribute as much as Hazzard and Mata in one way but I think he will get them to contribute a hell of alot more then they would if he was not there, sort of contributing to the added contributing of our players, more then anyone else I can think of we can get that will also bring in added revenue, and good will from fans of other clubs, A new fired up Wayne Rooney for England also might make us look slightly better to the football neutral fans out there that is another revenue stream

I agree he could be good, but after Torres I'm wary of the big marquee signing, guaranteed a place no matter what his form
and the effect that will have on the rest of the squad. His wages will become a negotiating tool for everyone else next season. Would Hazard, Lukaku, Mata etc be happy to stay on their existing contracts if they all outperformed him (which is very possible) or would we be creating a monster. At the moment, team spirit is very good and I think adding Rooney would jeopardise that.