Quote Of The Day
There are only two ways for me to leave Chelsea. One way is in June 2010 when I finish my contract and if the club doesn't give me a new one. It is the end of my contract and I am out. The second way is for Chelsea to sack me. The way of the manager leaving the club by deciding to walk away, no chance! I will never do this to Chelsea supporters.
Alrighty, then. I hate to indulge in what is commonly known as schadenfreude but man, am I happy to see this guy unemployed. I hate him from the depths of my heart. I also happen to think he has done merely a so-so job at Stamford Bridge. He never got to the Champions League final (with considerably more at his disposal than Rafa Benitez, who managed it twice in the same period) and was, in my mind, fortunate to catch both Arsenal and Man United when both clubs were in transition between two eras. He may be a great manager, but I don't think he showed it at Chelsea. Here's hoping Chelsea become more watchable in the upcoming weeks and months.
Oh and, by the way, do you know where Chelsea's next game is? Old Trafford.
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9 comments:
Ahsan,
Once again, I disagree with you! (Though I must admit I do enjoy the rest of you're blog)
How can you say- Arsenal and Man U were in transition between two eras. That is no justification for them not winning, if anyone has gone through a HUGE transition it has to be Chelsea; new owners, new management and new players.
Now to the other teams...
Liverpool,
Good for Rafa if he made it to two champions leagues, when was the last time he won the premiership, FA or Carling cup, or at least been in contention for the premiere league, which unlike the Champions league is the best judge of consistency.
United:
Whats Ferguson's excuse for not winning, he had all the same players and if anything threw Becks out!
Arsenal:
Arsenal had the same players and manager as well. All the people that left, did so because the team chose to not renew contracts or lack of first team play; pires, lumberg etc etc...
Last but not least look at Man city new management and a bunch of new players... being in their transition phase has not been a problem to them, so why let united and arsenal off so easy?
Jose is anything but mediocre, he has transformed the team and has been consistent with the trophies.
Unlike other teams he for the most part has stayed away from the big names and really built something that works (drogs, kalu, chech,Hilario (hero last year), Ferreira even terry and lamps became BIG NAMES only after playing under Jose. Can you honestly tell me that you had even heard of these players before (minus terry and lamps)
Jose can be arrogant I will give you that... The rest of you're claims just seem unfair and baseless.
aamer:
thanks for your comments. suffice it to say, i think you're wrong. let's examine your two central claims.one, man u and arsenal have not been in transition the last three seasons. two, chelsea have stayed away from big names.
1. you yourself point out that many of arsenal's players have left because of a lack of contract extensions. my point was THAT arsenal were in transition, not WHY arsenal were in transition. wenger has slowly but surely moved away from the henry-bergkamp-viera team to the current one, which bears litte resemblance to their championship days. he wanted to build a new team, a new YOUNGER team, which he has done. young teams don't win championships, it's as simple as that. similarly man u moved away from the becks-keane-van nistelrooy teams to the current one, which took a couple of years to gel and mature. so while arsenal and man u were preparing teams for the future, chelsea took advantage and won championships. in my mind, this takes the gloss of their outstanding record from 04-06 because they did not have true rivals the way spanish and italian champions did.
2. dude, can you seriously say this? drogba was a BEAST in france before coming over. they signed established superstars like makelele. they signed up and coming superstars like essien. for three years all chelsea did was buy big names. no reasonable fan can deny this.
i am prepared to admit that i am biased against mourinho and that my judgment may be clouded. but i do think the points i have raised are valid ones. you are of course entitled to disagree.
Ahsan..
To be honest at the time I wrote my post I had no idea that Jose had been sacked... I am indeed very, very sad!
I guess I see your points about Arsenal and united.However, the same logic can be used for Chelsea as well. They transitioned from the Desaily, Zola, Casaraghi, Vialli era to the Hassalbaink, zenden era with Raneri to end up with the team that they have now. It can be said that when united and arsnal were winning championships they were taking advantage of other EPL teams like chelsea who were in transition (though united did dominate for 9 or so seasons it was with the same crop of players for the most part). Taking credit away from Chelsea seems unreasonable, just as it would be to take it from Arsenal and United.
As for the big names you made my point. "signed up and coming superstars like essien" The fact is that these players were up and coming and nurtured to be as good as they have become. Freddie edu,fletcher are just some of the names of people who are tipped for greatness but FAIL! In comparison to teams like Real Madrid or United that bring established names like nistltoy, Veron, saha, rooney, Henery, Becks, Zidane,Robben etc. You have to give Chelsea credit for its foresight in looking for up and coming stars and making them house hold names.Jose's biggest rift was due to shevchenko who was a big name and just could not fit in chelsea (although I feel he will come around).
I agree we can agree to disagree but I do feel that English football has lost a lot of character with the departure of Jose.
i'm glad you brought up the "character" bit. many times, and this happens in all sports all round the world, the media and press fall in love with a guy for his wit and charm and begin to make him out to be better than he is. this also works in reverse: many times, an excellent athelete/coach/manager who has a dour or a sullen personality does not get the credit he deserves because the media doesnt "like" him. mourinho played this game perfectly...his press conferences were always stand up routines, he gave three paragraph answers to questions that other managers would give 2-sentence answers to, and the media lapped it up and bought into the whole "special one" bullshit. cut through the crap, and you have a manager who merely did what he was supposed to do - win domestically with a star-studded lineup. no one is begrudging him his success, all i'm saying is he's not - on the basis of his chelsea tenure - some brilliant mastermind strategist who conjured all those trophies out of nothing. my point in the post was that given the talent and competition he had, this was just about what was expected. his managerial skills at chelsea were, in a word, overrated.
good riddence to the 'arrogant one'. he had the sort of money at his disposal that other managers dream about, and then still has the nerve to complain about the quality of players available to him. if he is such a good manager then his answer to any problem shouldnt be to go out and spend on more players... if that was what was required then a monkey could manage chelsea. the players that did help him to the two league titles were predominantly players brought in by ranieri. manchester united have been hit the worst with injuries this season so far and have still managed to hold their own. the other 3 clubs have bought well and built a team around the players already available. the new manager who comes in at chelsea will expect to spend aswell now and bring in players of his choice... good luck to whoever takes over.
Anonymous, I am not one to resort to name calling but you are a MORON!
"Players that help Jose win were predominantly bought by Ranieri"... ARE YOU SERIOUS... Lets go down the list of the top performers that Jose bought...
DROGBA,Peter Chech, Hilario, Ferreria, Carvalho, Essien, Wright Philips, Kalu, John Obi. I am not even going to talk about the crop he brought in this season.
Which 3 clubs are you talking about in reference to the clubs that have bought well and built around there players? FYI the only thing separating United (who have supposedly held there own) and Chelsea is Goal difference, they have the same points. I will also remind you at this time that Chelsea has its fair share of injuries as well!
Do us all a favor and try looking at some facts and thinking through what you write... oh and have the courage to post with you're name.
Now that I have nothing more to say to you, Ahsan what are you're thoughts on the possibility of Jose coming to Barca? :)
they range from "heightened sense of nausea" to "about what the french felt in 1871 when they signed over alsace-lorraine to the germans in an agreement signed at the palace of versailles-home of the french monarchy".
Aamer its about time you checked some facts - of the players you have mentioned whom Jose brought into the Chelsea fold, only Carvalho and Drogba played any part in them winning the titles.
Oh and Cech was brought in by Ranieri not Jose.
In fact these are the players Ranieri brought in to the team - Lampard, Terry, Cech, Makalele, Wayne Bridge, Joe Cole, William Gallas, Arjen Robben and Eidur Gudjohnson, all of whom were pivotal in Chelse winning the title.
And I still believe that Crespo was a great signing who just never got a chance to play under Mourinho.
I do think that Jose is a great manager, but for the work he did at Porto. unfortunately you just can't judge the greatness of any manager working with an open cheque book. Though things appear to be changing at Chelsea.
Gallas I will give you, he was talented and really developed under Raneri.
As for the rest
Joe Cole:
Ranieri had wanted to send him to Russia on loan to CSKA Moscow just days after finalizing his transfer. Cole refused and was reduced to a peripheral figure after Ranieri signed Scott Parker in January 2004(who proved to be a bad sign).It was only after Jose came that J Cole was played and as a result made more appearances for Chelsea than he did during Ranieri's run.
Terry
Terry he came to Chelsea in 98 way before Raneri.
Lamps
Lamps, was bought by Raneri but developed under Jose, this can be seen by how he was called up for England as a regular only after Jose came.. Development of a player is a sign of a good manager.
Chech
I stand corrected although was a purchase of Ranaeri, he was a number 2 second string to cuduchini. It was only after Jose came that Chech got his big break to play for Chelsea.
Wayne Bridge was not a major player, he spend the later half of 04-05 injured and 05-06 he was replaced by Del Hornio as a preferred choice (not to mention that A Cole plays left back now)
Robben
Robben was injured for most of the campaign though I do not deny that he was a good sign. However, you may remember that it was around this time that Duff and J Cole were upset with the signing. He was a good player but never really got to play for Chelsea to make a big impact.
Now for your other comments, Crespo was unhappy at Chelsea and wanted to go back to Italy. Like Veron he was a good player but a bad sign for Chelsea.
As for the other players I mentioned, you did not address them and if you look at there numbers weather in terms of goals, assists or minutes played they all played a HUGE role in Chelsea’s winning (you cant just say it was Drogs and Carvehlio) The players you mentioned either developed under Jose or were injured or not played as much (Robben, Bridge, Gudjohnson and really did not play a ‘pivotal role’ in the winning the championships; a few games yes, championships no.
I am not disputing that Raneri had good singings, what I am saying is that he could not win with them and it was only under José that these players developed and actually started winning. I also still stand by the fact that Joses signings and management is what won the games. And you’re final check book comment was ludicrous because with that logic I guess we should not say Alex Ferguson is any good because when he was dominating the epl he was manger of the richest club in the EPL (by a Lot).
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