We should be amongst the favourites every season. It's only due due to the poor board management that we have not been able to show that over the last couple of the season on the pitch. We have a manager who has won the league before while the only other 2 clubs who have a chance of winning it have managers who will need time to settling into their new jobs (I expect it to be different next season). Are we right to be favourite? Yep we are if you take everything into account on Paper yep I think that's acceptable. Not sure it's going to end up that way but if i was to have anyone in charge when the other teams had major changes Jose would be the guy i would want to be in charge (carlo being the other one) to make sure we could take advantage of it

I don't think there's anything wrong with the odd tongue-in-cheek post. Take Codeblue's last post for instance, I'm sure he doesn't believe Man City are in worse shape than they were last season, they have a better manager and have improved on a squad that was probably the strongest in the Premiership already.
United may take time to settle down with Moyes. SAF was such a giant, iconic figure it's hard to imagine the transition will be totally seamless.
Arsenal have money to spend but Wenger is like one of those people who do all their shopping on EBay, he won't buy anyone unless he thinks he's getting a bargain. Unfortunately, it rarely works out that way any more, one of the hard facts of life is that you generally get what you pay for..forgetting Torres of course.
Tottenham would be my worry. I like the look of their squad, and if they add a quality striker they could be quite a force next season. But down the years, Spurs have promised to make that break through many times, and always fallen at the final hurdle.

Latest news appears to be that we have failed in a bid to bring back Didier Drogba ?

http://www1.skysports.com/football/n...-Didier-Drogba

I wonder how Essien will fit back into the team now hes back, and doesnt look like going anywhere else now Jose is here. Would be awesome to have him back to his best dominating the midfield, it isnt likely but surely he can still do a good job for us? He did ok at Real.

As for Drogba, i dont think he should return, hes a club legend and always will be, i dont see why he should return now at 35 years of age.

I'd love Drogba back as a coach. I think he'd do wonders with Lukaku in particular. As a player, I think we've all moved on and it would only tarnish his legacy.

Essien's under contract for another year and if he's fit we could use him in DM, unless of course De Rossi shows up. I wish it were mid August already so we had an idea of the squad.

Yes, I think Essien could provide cover at RB as well, he did that at RM I believe ? Even if Essien can only get back to 70/80% of the player he once was, he would be terrific as back-up for a season or two.

Don't understand the Drogba business. I think it's more about Didier having a future with the club in some non-playing capacity. Abramovich mentioned something along those lines back in January. Maybe Mourinho wanted to get him installed early as a talisman to help motivate the younger players, and the media have got the wrong end of the stick ?

Thank god for that. The last thing we need to do at this point in time is go backwards. It be different if we was trying to re-sign someone like Robben who could fit into our current style but if we are to win the league we won't win it with a battering ram

drog should never come back.

he won the champions league with his last kick, why tarnish that legend?

I'm already dreading potential overuse of Essien-Lampard-Cole-Terry in the same team. Bringing Drogba back would have me longing for the return of Benitez

Haha, yeah me too! Why stop there.... let's re-sign Carvalho and Ferriera and coax Ballack and Makalele out of retirement!

I am willing to at least give Essien a chance this season.

I dont give a rats arse how old a player is (will leave that to Arsenal fans). He was very unlucky with us in the past with injuries and will add some much needs strength which is going to be needed to mount a serious title challenge. At the moment we have nobody to put the stick about.

Lamps? Will still get us double figures next season and there is no one on the pitch who enjoys the pressure that will come after xmas if we on top or a couple of points behind the leader.

Cole will still one of our best players next season as he has been since he came to Chelsea, Other players have taken the headlines (Ash seems to get the wrong ones). But for the last few years he has been my player of the season. In the future names like Lamps,Drog,Mata etc will all go down in Chelsea history but for me Ash has been fantastic and as deserved as having the legend tag as Lamps and the Drog.

JT???? Well the school is still out on that one. He is still better then anything we have got at the moment (not really saying that much) and unless we go out and splash out big money on a defender it is likely to stay that way. Its going to go one with JT he is either going to have a great season with us or a awful one, I dont see any in the middle this season with him

Well after waiting in the Chelsea Virtual Waiting Room for what seemed an eternity at 7am this morning.......I have got tickets for the first game of the season!

I am so excited, just can't imagine what sort of reception JM is going to get!

Such a lovely virtual waiting room we have.

I have been kicked out of there more times then i care to remember.

Have had to have 3 computers all logged in before to get tickets for finals etc, The worst thing is its always the last computer i logged into that I got the tickets from

It would help if they at least let you know a rough time before you will get in! Couldn't go to the loo or get any breakfast, I was passing out!

Still, worth it, got tickets for the MHL which is my favourite bit of the ground.

Yea thats where my season tickets are.

Chelsea box office has always been poor. Not sure if it is the same guy in charge nowadays as it was when it was paper tickets, All you need to know is we nicked him from Milwall

Correct about Ashley Cole. One of our best ever signings.

Aah the good old virtual waiting room is still going strong

For me it would be very close to say our best ever one under Roman. Yes people could say Drogba,Maka,Cech etc and all reasonable calls and would accept them but Cole for me as been bang on since day one. Fully understand his POV in not being a Capt with all that it comes with but is a shame as think we would make a fantastic club and national one. Still for me first name on the team sheet when fit

Yes, I agree. Age is just a number, players like Terry, Cole, Lampard and even Essien can still do a job for us.
Terry won't play week in, week out, but unless we intend to spend a fortune on another world class CB, can you think of anyone who could provide better cover ?
Cole is still our first choice LB, with Ryan Bertrand failing to fulfil his early promise, he remains even more important for us.
Lampard defies his age, he has always been one of the fittest players in the Chelsea squad. He will have to be used more sparingly, buy some big clubs out there would have been only to pleased to gain his signature.
There is a question mark over Michael Essien, but he was never a player who relied on pace. If the power and timing are still there, he could still be a daunting figure to have in midfield alongside a player with "legs". He can't have been too bad last season anyway, Mourinho/Real Madrid wouldn't have sent him out to be a passenger, would they ?

We have become obsessed with the age of our players lately yet the same fans then turn around and have a go at Arsenal and say they need some experence.

We need a good mix of young and older players (something Utd have done perfectly since SAF arrived). With Chelsea we have made a habbit of going to far in one direction, either go for a team of older players or having a team full of youngsters. As a club we seem unable to get the balance right

we have the lowest average squad in the prem

Age isn't the - direct - issue. I think people have either misunderstood or ignored the key part of my post.

Cole is still quick, but not as quick as he used to be. He can't cover the same amount of ground without leaving us exposed at the back. If we lose the ball while he's up top we'd have a slow midfield, a slow John Terry and a fu*k-knows-where-he-is David Luiz to cover him.
Lampard's fitness is never in question, but his lack of pace now has to be because of the deeper role he plays. If he roams forward he leaves a big gap in midfield, plus his passing from deeper positions can be rather sloppy - a big issue if he's paired with Essien or Mikel and playing in front of Luiz/Terry.
Essien was horrible to watch in his last run with us. His tackling was more reckless than usual and he was basically a red card waiting to happen. A full season without injury will have done him the world of good, but he's still an unknown right now.
Terry...no idea. Always looked to me that Rafa used him to make a point. I can't believe he suddenly went from first choice to last choice in the space of a few months because of ability.


Those players can more than 'do a job' for us over the season, but that many players starting regularly together who have had their game affected by age and injury - and those who have always been slow, like Mikel - would absolutely be a problem over the course of a season.

I'm not saying I expect them to all be first choice, it was a just a thought triggered by the rumour of us going for Drogba again.

Even as a United fan i would agree

I agree with you as well, and don't think that's a contradiction of my previous post. I just want to see us make decisions firmly based on the form and current ability of individual players. This business of releasing players when they reach a certain age always seemed absurd to me. To be fair, we haven't done that recently, and appear to have had a rethink.

As I said, Ashley Cole appears to be our first choice, so he'll have to play in any important games while fit. I can see Lampard continuing to play alternate games, or coming off the bench. Same with Terry, but I've got more faith in David Luiz than you. I think we'll see a different player with Luiz next season, but that might be just wishful thinking.
As you say, we don't know what to expect from Essien. But it's hard to imagine that it will be any worse than we've seen from Mikel recently.
Whatever happens, we desperately need a top quality defensive midfield player. I couldn't stand another season picking two from Lampard, Ramires, Mikel and now Essien.
Of course, there's Luiz..that experiment was quite successful, but would he want to change position entirely at this stage in his career ?

And what? Do we get a cup? Do we get extra points for a win? Does it make a blind bit of difference or is it just a point less fact?

Trouble is we are so far behind where we should be due to mismanagement of when getting rid of players and bringing in players we are stuck for the next season or two with players like Ash being number 1. He is still probably amongst the 10 players in his position in Europe so we either spend millions and millions on a player who is slightly better then him but a couple of years younger (so we replacing the 7th best with 6th best) when the money is needed elsewhere (Centre backs for example). We could take a risk on youth but with two quite frankly shocking seasons league wise we have had I don't think we can afford to. What we need to do is stick with the Ash's Frank's of the world for the next season or two which they are more then able to do at a high enough level (unless the league has a massive improvement) until we have found suitable replacements. At the moment we would need to spend silly money which with FFP rules and our need to send elsewhere I not sure we can afford to do (while staying single points from the title)