Champions of Europe Thread [2012-2013]

[Arnau]

Do you really think Mourinho will play with that crap of Mikel?

 

[Filipower]

Apparently Mou's already thinking of getting rid of the Spaniards

 

[Mandieta6]

Mou got Mikel, who is not crap. We also have Romeu and Essien and even Lamps. It's simply not a priority.

 

[Arnau]

Do you want to fight for titles or a CL spot?

Mangala, De Rossi and a world class #9 are the priorities to me. Lampard is old and far from his best but i don't think there is anything better than him in the market.

 

[Filipower]

Lamps and Terry will be hard to deal with. Both should be benched, but in the bench they'll murder a manager, so they should go, but it's impossible to send them away. Either they understand their time is done and work for the team as great back-ups and locker room morale, older players, or it's going to be really hard.

 

[Arnau]

If Mourinho manages to give them a similar role to Materazzi's at Inter i don't think there will be any Iker in Chelsea's locker room bitching the the project. They are still useful players as well.

 

[Filipower]

Yeah, if anyone can keep those two in check it's probably him. We'll see...

 

[Arnau]

Does anyone knows where will this guy going to play next season?

 

[Sir Didier Drogba]

If the Schurrle deal goes through he will spend a year on loan at Leverkusen as a sweetener.

I 100% agree with Arnau on the Mikel issue, I actually cannot understand Mandieta6's persistent and irrational dedication to him.

 

[Mandieta6]

Terry and Lampard love Mou and both have seen time on the bench this season without complaint. They know they're old, they'll deal with it.

De Bruyne will go either to Leverkusen or Dortmund on loan, I think.

I don't think De Rossi, or Matic, or Fellaini or anyone of that mould is a priority. Mikel and Essien are fine, a we need someone wo can orchestrate play from deeper and initiate transitions quickly. Mikel is very underrated and I don't really understand why. He wouldn't be my first choice in a perfect world, but we have other gaps to fill and he's not the weakest link right now. In a first-choice duo of Mikel and Lampard, replacing Lampard with someone like Gundogan/Modric would help us far more than replacing Mikel with De Rossi/Matic. We also have Chalobah who has a lot of promise and could be the perfect fit, once he gets more top-level experience. Getting De Rossi would make sense in that perspective, assuming he doesn't cost much more than the current 10m bid.

A CB like Mangala is more important than DM, but it is also not the most important thing right now. I'd be happy if we got De Rossi and Mangala, sure, but we need a striker and a playmaker MC more than that. Backup goalkeepers and Luke Shaw more important too, although I don't think they'd be that expensive (we could get any of Fabianski, Robinson, Schwarzer, Aouate, Cerny for free and Shaw would probably cost around 10m).

I posted this on another site, here. They're doing a competition to see how would fans spend the alleged 100m warchest that Benitez implied there was on transfers this summer. It's long, but basically, I went with:

IN:

Mark Schwarzer - Free - Fulham

Paul Robinson - Free - Blackburn

Eliaquim Mangala - 30m - Porto

Luke Shaw - 12m - Southampton

Thiago Alcantara - 18m - Barcelona

Andre Schurrle - 22m - Leverkusen

Lazar Markovic - 7m - Partizan

Robert Lewandowski - 25m - Dortmund

OUT:

Henrique Hilario - Free - ???

Ross Turnbull - Free - ???

Paul Ferreira - Free - ???

Florent Malouda - Free - ???

Yossi Benayoun - Free - ???

Jeffrey Bruma - 2m - PSV

Gary Cahill - 12m - Tottenham

OUT ON LOANS:

Romelu Lukaku - Swansea

Marko Marin - Norwich

Luke Shaw - Southampton

Nathaniel Chalobah - Fulham

Patrick van Aanholt - Aston Villa

Josh McEachran - Cardiff

Gael Kakuta - Crystal Palace

Kenneth Omerou - Hull

Kevin De Bruyne - Dortmund

Thibaut Courtois - Atletico de Madrid

Lucas Piazon - Malaga

Tomas Kalas - Malaga

Lazar Markovic - Vitesse

Nathan Ake - Vitesse

Thorgan Hazard - Vitesse

Wallace - Vitesse

Delac, Blackman, Bamford, Kane, et al. - English lower divisions

Which leaves us with:

Reserve: Schwarzer, Robinson, Terry, Ivanovic, Bertrand, Romeu, Lampard, Moses, Ba, Torres.

I suppose swapping the bid for Shaw for one for De Rossi would make us better this season, but I think getting Shaw (or another L is much more important in the long-term.

 

[Arnau]

Mangala is left footed and you can't sign Lewandowski, he has already agree with Bayern. I think Mou will want Lukaku on his team. You have got a big problem with Torres, could become a Kaka case.

 

[Mandieta6]

I'm still keeping hope on Lewandowski, it's not done yet, and Dortmund would sure as hell favour us. Then switch Mangala and David Luiz around, Luiz can play on either side of the pairing. I can see Mou keeping Lukaku, I certainly wouldn't mind that. If that were the case, I'd shift those 25m for Lars Bender or Marouane Fellaini and not get any striker. OR, see if I can get De Rossi and Higuain/Soldado for that same amount.

Torres won't return to his top level, ever, I don't see any sign that is going to happen. That said, as a 2nd/3rd choice, he's perfectly serviceable right now. He spent the 2nd half of the season rotaitng and played fine, so I don't see a problem with it if you push him down the pecking order and put Lukaku/Lewandowski in.

 

[yoyo913]

^ I hope Mou makes Lukaku a star.

 

[Mandieta6]

Mou managed to help guys like Mikel, Balotelli, and Varane to step it up, I'm pretty optimistic about his ability to mold the vast amount of talent he has at Chelsea.

 

[Arnau]

Mikel didn't step up, he only worsened.

 

[Mandieta6]

Mikel is a good DM, I really never get the hostility. He's not world-class, but he's the best we have at Chelsea, and I'd say that he would probably start for any other side in the Prem right now.

 

[Sir Didier Drogba]

Lukaku should and probably will be Mourinho's new Drogba, and Mourinho described Drogba as the best player he ever worked with.

 

[Sir Didier Drogba]

I dont even know anything about Mangala, cant we sign Hummels?

 

[Mus]

So I'm going to be watching a lot of Chelsea next season, can you guys sign me a token Italian?

 

[Coruja]

http://www.abola.pt/nnh/destaque.aspx?id=406886&zona=4