Costa was trash today. I absolutely hate those antics. You could have whispered in his ear and he'd have grabbed his nose and flopped over.
What was the deal with Oliver talking to Conte and Mourinho? And for the record, with everything he's said leading up to this...******** him.
Only side that I think that is perfect to expose our deficiencies and kill us. Should be a good game. Our finishing deserted us today but United were playing very deep after the red. Our long shots really aren't that great and Costa was just terrible. He did his bit occupying the defenders but his antics far outweighed any little good that he brought.
They were getting quite heated. Have to say, Conte looks quite intense. The man seems like any language he'd learn he'd find out what the words are for "to fight."
That's Mourinho's shtick, though. Say something inflammatory, get the other person wound up, and thrive off of it. Case in point, look what happens to Wenger whenever Jose mentions Arsenal. That said, I don't pay attention to what Jose says. Haven't for years. He's still a significant part of Chelsea, no matter how much he wants to associate with United.
I could do without Costa. I appreciate the goals, but the antics are just tedious. Wish we would have managed to pry loose Morata or another. Would love Griezman, but that's probably pipe dreamin'. Win's a win, but I would guess they'll be disappointed with the performance. Spurs are a tough draw, but maybe easier w/o Kane.
And then there was this. Hazard was targeted all match long but this crosses the line and far outdoes anything Costa did out there today. Lengthy ban hopefully. https://www.thesun.co.uk/sport/foot...r-appearing-to-stamp-on-chelseas-eden-hazard/
Jose's gameplan was pretty flawed. Basically, try to outphysical us. Didn't work. We stuck to our plan and didn't retaliate once. Azpi's two shots in the 2nd half - LOL. I thought Costa was OK. He did what Conte asked of him, I think. He is always a bit bobbly with the ball in terms of touch and going at defenders, which makes the criticisms of Lukaku on this board kind of funny. He was play acting at the end there. Drogba did it too. I hate it, but its part of the game. When I saw the Rojo kick, I was really surprised NOBODY made any more of it. Announcers, the players, no one. It was blatant and dirty. He is a dirty player. Valencia got away with a two footed tackle. Jose can complain all he wants but United coul dhave been down to 9. The ref talks to the captain about not fouling Hazard. Herrerra and does it within two seconds. Goodbye. I love love love that United's two losses in the last however many games were to us. Without Ibra, United are lost. And even with Ibra, we beat them 4-0.
REALLY surprised the stamp isn't getting more attention. costa's antics during the match were frustrating, but up until this game he's staying mostly calm for the season and looks to have really tried to cut some of the antics out. he's also been crucial to the teams place in the table right now. let's not kneejerk and suddenly forget all the good progress he's made. i'm not excusing the behavior, not at all, last season i mentioned how fed up i'd become with it. but don't let this one relapse spur conversations about what we wish we had instead right now. seems short sighted to forget how well he's done over the last 7 months. besides, given the hazard targeting, it's pretty obvious to me that the CBs were told to try to wind up Costa as well. right or wrong, that's not a dig on jose, it's a strategy that you take with players that very clearly ride the line the way costa does.
What I find most curious (not that I'm surprised) is reaction from fans. It should be pretty obvious at this point that unless both sides agree on (insert PK, foul, goal, etc...) a particular call, the view will be heavily bias. So what's the point of calling the other side blind, idiots, morons, or whatnot. Just say straight up that if the shoe was on the other foot, your opinion would take a 180 degree turn. If a Chelsea player got sent off for what Herrera did, we'd be pissed. That's it. It's ridiculous how fans just see things absolutely different when opinions don't align. That said, Jose is Jose. He'll always be remembered and I hope all Chelsea fans keep his memories sweet. However, we all knew he was always going to be one of those "love to have on your team, but otherwise, we'd hate him." Clearly, he's that type of a character. He'll say stupid shit, incorrect shit, mean shit. Pogba best player on the pitch? LOL United were in full control before the red card? Control of what? Chelsea were toothless before the red? Did he miss De Gea's 2 world-class saves before that? Whatever. I'm sure our match at OT will be fun.
I agree and disagree. It's not as simple as was it a yellow card offense or not. They kept hacking him down. And this is after Hazard getting hacked down at West Ham last week. I'm tired of it. Oliver told Jones and Smalling using examples of them systematically hacking him down. 15 seconds later Herrera does it with a yellow card already. It soft for sure but really late. I would hope that one of our players doesn't put himself in that situation to begin with. Herrera has always been a hothead. I will always appreciate what Mourinho did for us. That will never change. Fans and pundits saying we are nothing without him is ********ing laughable at best though. With Claudio we made a semi and finished second in the league. Not bad for one season. We are where we are at because of Roman's investment not Mourinho's managerial skill. He's part of our history not all of it. With all that said, if he is going to slate us over and over there will be a further deterioration of the love fest we as fans have for him. He's said some pretty shady shit so far this year when he didn't need to. It's a two way street and he thinks it's a one way street.
I completely agree but I'd add that it's important to pont out that Costa's behavior was disgusting. I hate that part of anyone's game.
With Blue on this. Targeting a player and seeing Eden take several bad kicks is BS. ******** seeing it from the other side. They had a shit, dirty gameplan and it backfired. Now that prick Rojo hopefully gets to go on a little vacation as well. Their team is full of tempermental, ill disciplined douche canoes not to mention its run by one. As far as Costa goes, I was extremely vocal about his shit last season to the point I wouldve been happy to see him go, so for me the whole "look at your players" argument is invalid as I don't have bias when it comes to this sort of thing.
Jose is Jose. We all know who he was when he was here. He has gotten more cantankerous with age - his "mind games" were more tongue in cheek in his first spell in England, they became meaner the second time around. That said, we do owe him an amazing debt and he's clearly the best manager in our history, so he'll always have my respect. But that said, we know what happens when he tries to kick teams off the pitch, we've seen it before, and we've seen it fail before too. It's all part and parcel of Jose.