City vs Chelsea pre-match thread

[Zin 'messiah' Zimmer]

You rotate a higher percentage of players than extra percentage of games played, do the research. Lets see who the 'right' tit is at the end of the season genius.

What's his plan b, you haven't answered what he does when his revolutionary 343 system is exposed...

 

[abu13]

We should be looking to win this but the reality is that they are in better form than us. As such the key is not to lose, we need to be in touching distance come January.

 

[Father Paul]

May I ask why?

Btw I respect your opinion but I hope many don't think this. Game doesn't have the barometer of meaning to much at this stage.

Best to replace won't with"probably won't". Why ? It will leave us adrift of Chelsea and perhaps Liverpool with a very tough fixture list coming up. More importantly the
damage to our inner belief while difficult to quantify will most likely be significant particularly if we are well beaten. I would ask you to cast your mind back to last November when the
dippers roasted our butts at home. I said afterwords that we would not recover from the psychological damage inflicted and had very little chance of winning the league. Many deluded souls poured scorn on this ( some of whom believed we would still win the league after successive home defeats to the surprise winners and spuds in February) and maintained it was only 3 points and we would turn it around.
Now I will not comment until after the match but one thing is clear a bad performance and a bad result will be very hard to recover from even at this relatively early stage. Personally I think we will get a draw so I expect us to stay in it at least for another few weeks and hopefully all the way to May.

 

[Father Paul]

I was just about to post exactly this. If Chelsea go toe to toe with us, we can and probably would win imho.

But if they sit back, they are extremely well organised and good at defending and we will struggle to break them down. Inevitably we would end up being caught on the break and looking at our defensive frailties, I think it's unlikely we'd keep a clean sheet if it goes that way.

Bizarrely; our best tactic might be to sit back, let them have the ball, and then him *them* on the break. In a way, a bit like how the Barca game played out

Our defending has looked shaky at times because often we are over extended high up the pitch. When we stay compact and organised we actually do defend pretty well and we have the quality to hurt them if we nick the ball back off them when they are building an attack of their own. Fernandino will be our most important player imho.

This may happen and a stalemate emerge. Bet on a draw

 

[cibaman]

We should be looking to win this but the reality is that they are in better form than us. As such the key is not to lose, we need to be in touching distance come January.

/

Form usually changes with the outcome of a single game. Which could be this one. I dont see that recent form has much relevance for this game. We will be well prepared, have a near full strength squad to pick from. I cant see any reason why we shouldnt be at or very near to our best.

 

[kaz7]

With a weeks rest and play like the barca game we can get the points,not too worried about it tbh

 

[Danny_Johnson4]

Already won 7, beating City would be 8 in a row.

Ok Thanks, ok...don't see them winning 8 in a row!

 

[KDBestplayerintheworld]

Expect a biblical match up in midfield for this one, wouldnt be overly surprised if we matched up 3-4-3 as I can imagine pep sees chelseas shape as their biggest asset
Don't want to pray on the absolutely tragic nature of the Chapeco plane crash but dont underestimate the motivation of fernandinho for this game. He has many friends in brazil and probably in that squad which died, hence his doing the speech yesterday and being given the day off training.
Fancy his battle v Kante to be crucial and I truly think he will be a man possessed this weekend. Don't see chelsea winning 7 (i think?!) games in a row in this PL and I dont see us missing the opportunity to show our superiority technically on saturday

I know it is a team game but **** me that Chelsea side individually shouldnt live with ours
A back 3 of Cahill Luiz and Azpilicueta can be got at, but its the 2 in front that are vital to them. If we can make the gap between matic/kante and their front 3 large enough, we should dominate the ball and game

I think Chelsea are already on 7 now, aren't they?

Think you're underestimating the individual class in Chelsea's team a bit mate. Yes City is superior, but only just, imho if we compare 1 v 1 in a 343 system:

Bravo < Courtois (0-1)
Kolarov > Cahill (1-1)
Otamendi < Luiz (1-2) (*)
Stones > Azpilicueta (2-2)
Sterling > Alonso (3-2)
Zabaleta < Moses (3-3)
Fernandinho = Kanté (3-3)
De Bruyne > Matic (4-3)
Silva = Hazard (4-3)
Nolito = Pedro (4-3)
Agüero > Costa (5-3)

(*) "Chat sh**" about Luiz all you like, but in this formation, as a leader and organizer of a 3-man-defence, I think he's brilliant.

And I don't think many chavs will agree Hazard is not superior to Silva and Costa is inferior to Agüero ...

So make no mistake both as a team and individually, Chelsea are going to be extremely difficult to beat.

 

[kaz7]

Early games are not great so maybe a damp squid

 

[KDBestplayerintheworld]

Early games are not great so maybe a damp squid

:D http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/ukn...-The-top-10-misquoted-phrases-in-Britain.html