I think giving Luiz 'freedom' in midfield would be a lot more beneficial. He's a flair player, he should be allowed to venture forward more. For me, Luiz doesn't suit the CB position. And as for Mikel, was it something like his 180th PL game today without a goal? I mean, i know he wasn't intended to be a goalscoring Midfielder, but still, what does he actually contribute? He should only ever play when we're wanting to hold on to a 2 nil lead or something, he shouldn't be playing when we're in need of a goal!

Cahill's in the form of his life, yet finds himself on the bench? Baffling to say the least!

We look poor, and unlikely to be winning anything ATM, still it's early in the season i guess, so no need to panic yet!

Eto'o looked amazing compared to Torres who I forgot was on the pitch till he mishit a shot from about 8 yards out. At one point I was screaming get Lukaku on, then I remembered. He'll be glad he went there at least as they look a decent side.

Eto'o looked lively although wasnt as sharp as he could have been, the signs are there that he can do a job for us once he settles in though, IMO. Agree that Torres was a complete waste, he did nothing once he came on.

The best thing is that Eto'o looked lively and looking for the ball, but Torres just drifts out of games and is anonymous. Why we stick with him is mind boggling, he has never looked happy with us and he should just bloody leave, it would benefit everyone really.

Our only hope in shifting Torres is if he doesn't play much between now and January, loses his place in the Spanish squad and decides he needs to move to win a World Cup place with them.

He should be firmly behind Eto'o and Ba. Wouldn't even waste a place on the bench with him anymore.

Torres aside, I'm pretty upbeat with our loss. We looked decent, they looked decent, they won. I think we'll only get better this season so can't complain. The 3 at the back formation looked promising though would be nice to see it where the additional attacking player was someone other than Torres.

Yep, so frustrating when City and United have been so unimpressive too so far. The league is really there for the taking this season.

Indeed, and Joses previous days we would have got something out of that game, a draw or a win even if we were playing badly. Which made the difference really. Now adays we look vulnerable at times, and did today. He still has a lot of work to do if hes going to get us to the title this season.

It is, however like City, like United, Chelsea are still going through the transitional period. New manager's, new players, new styles of play etc...

Eto'o looked sharp, that's the only plus taken from todays game. Interested to see how Willian fairs in our next game (if he even makes the squad ). Mata showed willing, however he didn't look happy IMO, a shame really as we need him firing.

Torres came on, that's all you can say about him really!

Bad performance today. Like i said, it's early days, but these type of results/performances can't keep up if we want to win the League this season.

Had enough chances to get something but really faded towards the end.
Didn't like Jose's substitutions much either.
Early days and still lots of work to do.

I liked his thinking when I saw he was taking Cole off for a striker......then I remembered who the striker was.


Schurrle was awful today. Ivanovic was basically playing RW because that guy was nowhere to be seen.

Mouro looks (and sounds) as if hes had enough already

Sorry, I've never believed in the "transition" business. A club that has the Abramovich billions doesn't need to take a couple of seasons out to adjust.
We lack a cutting edge up front, and did nothing in the summer to put that right. We had more than 20 attempts on goal, about a third of those on target, and couldn't find the net once.
I couldn't see us scoring if we'd played another 90 minutes, Everton looked more dangerous and likely to score than us on the break.
Let's not kid ourselves, Eto'o is not the answer. Like everyone else I was hoping for a miracle, but it's not going to happen.
Eto'o was willing, and for that reason alone he's an improvement on Torres, but he's not the player he was. But I think we all knew that.
We spent a fortune on Willian and Schurrie, strengthening an area where we were already acknowledged to be among the strongest teams in the Europe. We needed a top quality striker and a strong defensive midfield player. We either failed or didn't bother to get them, that's why we are unlikely to win much this season.

That's something I will never ever understand . Why you never ever play Ba. As a nufc fan I'd have him back.

Purely because Ba didn't have a £50m price tag. Torres gets picked so often in an attempt to justify the money we paid for him. Stupid as it's just harming the club further. Wouldn't be surprised if Ba rejoins you in January.

Enough of the dribbling Fernando. Remember that run you made in the box against Munich? Please do more of that!

Chelsea must regret letting Daniel Sturridge go now.

Just not got the depth of squad this season. Why has it been the last few seasons the squad has been so small?

Only now? We've missed him since about 5 months before he even left. Moronic decision that looks increasingly worse with each passing game.....still, the club must be happy, they don't seem to want decent strikers here.

If they had got top European targets as rumoured it would be fine losing these players but when they go on scoring goals for rival top four sides it makes it look a bad decision.

I mean what happened to Chelsea signing players like Hulk?

You can now add Moses to that, and Luk when he starts scoring for Everton.

Loaning Moses to Liverpool was a stupid decision as I said at the time. Why help them get back into the Top 4? We shouldn't be loaning any players to them, Arsenal, Spurs, City or United for that matter. Plenty of other Premier League clubs would have been interested I'm sure.

Thankfully it didn't happen.

Its a tricky one.

He cannot play against us, and could be used to take points from our rivals like city, united and arsenal.

The only way loan signings are not good is if you loan to a team above you!

In an ideal world, we could buy top strikers for teams like LFC, Spurs, Everton (which we have), Swansea, Villa etc and they would benefit from them against our rivals, and could not be used against us.

It makes the lon system quite corrupt, and should be banned between prem teams

They are above us!

for now

The question is, where do we go from here ?
The decision to sell Sturridge was wrong, and many of us said so at the time. We loaned out Lukaku again, another bad decision in my opinion. That leaves us with Eto'o, Torres and Ba.
It looks to me as if Eto'o will be similar to Torres, except he will play with a smile on his face..a welcome change I admit. I know it's early days, and he probably isn't fully match fit, but the old pace doesn't seem to be there and it was surprising how easily he was out-muscled when in possession.
Looking at our Premiership rivals, and the other top clubs around Europe, we are in a sorry state as far as strikers are concerned. We will just have to hope that our midfield superiority can keep us in games, and that a few of those will chip in with enough goals to keep us challenging for some silverware.