Excellent 1st half. 2nd half was a bit "after the Lord Mayor's show" but never mind.
Of the 'new boys' De Bruyne was impressive. Schurrle showed some good touches. Didn't see enough of van Ginkel to form an opinion. Lukaku showed some good physicality. Come on Jose, please please play him from the start against Villa.

Nice to see Jose back and very impressed with the pace of the first half. Lots of players seem out to impress. Hope Lukaku starts on Wednesday as Torres seemed to burn out after a very impressive first 20 minutes. Would be too much to hope we could maintain that pace for 90 mins, but it was nice to see we are capable of it. Looking forward to this season.

Palace Supporter coming in peace. Have a question for me fantasy football team really. Is Mata gonna be a bit part player? or is he gonna get some starts?

I would have thought Mata is still ahead of De Bruyne in the pecking order. Oscar is a bit different with his defensive qualities. Mata will get plenty of starts, in my opinion anyway.

Cheers Richmond, thanks for your opinion. I'd be interested to hear what others think but what I see of him in your live TV matches last season I thought he was quality. Hence why I put him in, as you can imagine, most disappointing he didn't even get on.

I guess it is a gamble putting Chelsea players in a fantasy football team with the size of your squad and the quality in it.

^ Mata isn't fully fit at the moment, which is why he didn't play any part today as he wasn't needed anyway.

Wasn't he on the bench though? appreciate you did say "fully" fit though.

Yes, but Mourinho obviously thought the best option was to let Mata rest this game out. I think you're safe enough leaving him in your team, I don't think he'll pick you up so many points as he did last season though. With fantasy football, I always think its better to look for the less obvious choices.

Semi decent start to the season as much as can be expected with the fitness of the team.

How different it is to watching games without the feeling of dread of the interms time that we was a second away from letting in a silly goal.

A good team performance which was the most important thing, Everyone played their part spot on. Glad we got another game before Utd as I think it might have come too soon for us with only that game under our belts. Hopefully we can extend the tempo for a hour against Villa other then the 45 minutes in the first game. But that will only come with games. Back to back home games will be a massive help for us.

Lukaku should have come on sooner for the hapless Torres.
However, once he did come on i couldn't help think a player like him wouldn't even get on Utd's bench, nevermind be the main hope for this season.

Very strange we are starting with two home games and Villa with two away. How did the computer come up with that one?

I think the super cup had something to do with it as no one else is playing.

Yea and plus Jose wanted it played before the Utd game.

Part of the reason I think he wanted that was going to OT already 3 points in front of Man Utd (so a win means its 6 points) is perfect for his mindgames ha ha

I think all the subs was spot on myself.

Torries was doing the job given to him, Plenty of running around etc,

With the news that United have made a move for Fellaini (and Baines) wll we renew our interest ?
The United offer of £16m is derisory and will probably have angered Everton, despite the Moyes connection. If we could get a decent price for Mikel from someone (it was rumoured that £10m had been offered) another £15m could maybe secure us Fellaini. That sounds like a great deal to me, and Fellaini would presumably feel at home joining our little Belgian contingent ?

Think we left it to late now. It would still take a week or so of talks leaving it to late for Everton to find a replacement. They have lost their manager and will need alot of money to lose one of their top players

I'd offer them Mikel as a makeweight in a deal for Fellaini. You never know our luck, Martinez might actually rate him as a player!

Toure and Fernandinho looking ominous in centre midfield. Their whole team look ominous and recovered from whatever that was last season. They're a pleasure to watch at the moment, so really looking forward to playing them.

City are the team I dread playing most. They had the better of us even with that clown Mancini in charge......not looking forward to our matches against them this year.

After tonight, and with our piss-poor strikers, we have zero chance of being anywhere near City at the end of the season!
At best, it's looking like another 3rd or 4th place, and then what for next season???

Yes, they look a formidable outfit. What a difference a player like Yaya Toure would make to Chelsea ! Fernandinho and Navas look great signings, with Silva, Nasri and Aguero they have a lot of creative talent as well. And that's without seeing their other signing Jovetic who is highly rated.
Dzeko wasted some chances though, It will be interesting to see if Negredo ends up as their first choice.
Newcastle look to be in real trouble, they could easily have conceded 7 or 8 tonight.

edit.

at best 4th?

City are the competition, have no doubt about that. However, i believe that united have stood still and arsenal have gone backwards.

We should be looking at 2nd minimum. We also have to remember that city have thrown another 100m plus at their team this summer.

3rd is about right.

All this rubbish about Utd and since SAF going they going to drop like a stone is fantasy. Utd still have some great players and while this might be the poorest Utd side people have seen for a while its still miles better then just about every team in the league and not far off the teams who are on their level. They still have little extra that when come Christmas that while the two teams around draw they go and get 3 points.

i agree with you on that!
However, it looks like Spurs and Liverpool have improved and could be a danger to us.

I still expect the same issues to stop Spurs gettting to 3rd, They need that little bit more experence yet. AVB needs another season with them and 2 more windows to get them to that standard