I think second half suck-the-life-out-of-the-game display is simply Jose's touch. Three points in the bag, so save energy to try play the first XI as much as possible. Last season, first game vs Hull, first half some of the best football we ever played, second half tutup kedai. I think it's by orders, clearly we can see overlap on wide areas have stopped.

basically everyone sits below half way line except when theres opportunity to counter, imagine if drogs scored this morning

If Drog scored, today v'll be seeing Chelsea thread V29. Coz the current thread sure all Chelsea fans on steroids and post non stop.

such a humble guy. Cesc actually thot of shooting before making the flick to Andre. He saw Andre is in a better position, so he flick the ball to Andre.

Yup. He took only glimpse of his options before making the correct decision. And kudos to the German, after he run past Iva and didn't get the pass, it would have been very easy for him to stop his run, but he continued running.

Also the Hazard running straight into the throat of the Burnley team prior to that goal dragged most of their players back, even if we lose that ball after that, very hard for them to counter since we had plenty of bodies behind the ball.

Haih.. i find it very hard to stop talking about yesterday match

A very very gud team goal imo. I oso lo. That goal keep replaying in my mind.

Nid to b kful, dun happy too fast. Later premature ejakulasi. pancit in the middle of the season. *touch wood!*

TheChelseaViews ‏@TheChelseaViews 1h

Ramires, Oscar, Willian & Filipe Luis has all been called up for Brazil's friendlies against Colombia & Ecuador. #CFC

No love for Courtois? (Kortua )
He is EXTREMELY tall. With his arms in the air collecting the ball from crosses, he looks like 8ft tall. I like his ball catching ability, instead of punching out the ball, he magnet kept the ball in this hand.

we're looking much better compared to last season, but its just 1st game so im gonna hold my expectations first

didnt play the FPL for gameweek 1, just joined LYN chelsea league. gonna start from gameweek 2

enjoyed the game immensely, especially the first half. second half we kept good control of the match. the greedy side of me wanted us to make a statement of intent towards all the other EPL contenders but the cautious side of me knows how devastating an unnecessary injury can be to our squad. in the end we did good and the second goal was a work of art.

some minor gripes though - hazard looked very low key, even if it's the first game of the season. some minor lapses in concentration within the defense, and that part of me which is a little worried that we essentially have no 'back-up' for either fabregas or costa. no sense getting worked up over something we can't change (although the transfer window is still open *cough* message to roman *cough*) i guess.

p.s: how about that first touch touch and volley from didier though??contender for goal of the season had that one gone in! if torres could just absorb half of that drogba-like confidence (or better yet, rediscover his own!), he'd get 20 goals easy.

if it's possible, please get a real world class winger/am before the transfer window close. I'm gonna get a heart attack watching Oscar play ... we can't just rely on Fabi-Costa-Matic and expect them to start altogether in every game..

i think oscar did ok. just overshadow by fabregas a bit. love how they cover for each other. or more like swapping position between CM and AM. both of them all over the field in last match. same goes to hazard. he is all over the place.

yeah i think Oscar did quite ok too. quite energetic up and down the pitch. the main playmaker now is Fabregas so he seems to always be with the ball.

i think now we have a few reliable playmaker in our squad.

Wif Oscar, Fab and Matic playing. It looks like a 4231. But imo, kinda feel like a 433 too. Oscar and Fab is like taking turn to dictate play. Fab with his passing, Oscar with his position higher on the pitch.

But tbh, I think Oscar indeed was overshadowed by Fab's performance a bit yday. Can't blame Oscar, only can blame Fab being too perfect in his debut match. 2 assist and involve in all goal.

Yep I've heard some saying that. Oscar has done his job covering attacking and defensive line and swap position with Fabi to enhance whole team's mobility, ok I get that. But "hardworking" is never a term to justify world class winger/am. Work rate is one of most basic abilities needed in Mourinho's squad, and Ramires, Willian, Mikel all have that.

Since Mourinho only played a 45 minutes attacking football, I will just analyse Oscar's performance during 1st half.
1) He dropped the ball too easily. Whenever he's dribbling, holding, trying to make spaces, he always caught by Burnley players (yes it's only Burnley) and it's always endanger the team when someone lost his ball.
2) As you can see, Oscar had run all along the pitch and he was hardworking. But did you see him making clearance or standing in the right spot when Burnley players were attacking? No, it's always Matic and 4 defenders who do the job.
3) Ok defensive work is not main priority for an am/winger. He should be contributing deadly passes (Fabi's specialty), has great vision on how the team organizing attacking, defensive works on the pitch (Matic, Fabi's specialty), or dribbling, running, and trying to tear out opponent's defence whenever the chances come (Hazard's expertise), this is what attacking players should do. Instead, whenever I saw someone passed the ball to Oscar, he is running backwards and going back to defensive line (what the...?!), he was destroying every attacking chances given to him when the forwards were running and expecting him to do counter attacks or passes a through ball, in another word, he is slowing the team and not the opposite.

In fact, he was almost non-existent when Burnley scored their first goal, and Chelsea made a comeback with 1,2,3 goals thanks to Costa, Fabi, and Schurrle. How was this helping the team? I don't know. When someone is in that position, we should expect him to be contributing to goals and not only give credit for time wasting or mere coordination when team has secured a victory.

Oscar has been given a lot of chances.
Last season, Mou gave him chances and alienate Mata. Mata was transferred out and he went invisible. In the end, Chelsea got nothing.
During World Cup, he was absolute first team and playmaker in Brazil. Brazil won all its matches by small margin only because of Neymar and pure luck. When Neymar was out, you saw what happen to Brazil.
And now, we're talking about the first match. When it comes to "overshadow" , I think it applies to Hazard (failed to gain an assist or goal coz of Fabi's brilliance and Mou's tactic), but certainly it does not apply to Oscar.

Oscar may be good (depend on certain standards) but he is not World Class.
Chelsea is World Class, Mou is World Class, the defending line is ...hence we only lack 1 more am/winger.

Anyway, this is just my sincere opinion and I have no intention to offend anyone.
Feel free to have discussion with me (whether you agree or not) but let's avoid flaming with each other.

ps: Considering the threads above, looks like everyone think Oscar did ok and it seems I'm the Black Sheep here.
Well I certainly hopes that Chelsea continue achieving good result, and ultimately win the League Title (with all the efforts, Mourinho really should) and therefore I wish for the best of Oscar and hope he can assist, score goals and play beautiful football to prove me wrong in the near future.

^ ok then, I'll msg Roman to sell Oscar to PSG.

inb4 #Oscarout

It's all about balance. Yes, Oscar natural position is playmaker. But Mou see his other speciality too, his workrate.

Last season, our pivot were not creative enuff. Hence Oscar have to burden the playmaking along with Hazard and Wiliian. But now, we have Fab in pivot who can be a deep lying playmaker. Oscar vs Fab. Who is proven in the PL? Of coz FAb. He had so many season in PL dy, Oscar just had 3 season in the PL. So naturally, Mou will want the more experience player (Fab) to do the playmaking. While Oscar's role for now is similar to Ramires. Tbh, for now I see our playmaking going thru Fab, Hazard. Not Oscar and Schurrle. Oscar's job shud be sumthing like Ramires' job last season. Schurrle's job will be like runner + odd goal.

Btw, let's not be too harsh on Oscar. These brazillians, germans have had a long summer playing the WC. They joined up with the squad quite late in the pre season. Match fitness and form could also be a thing. Let's judge Oscar after 1/3 of the season.

Tldr version. I foresee Oscar playing in a different type of role now that Mou is using Fab as a deep lying playmaker. Imho, Oscar is our best midfielder in pressing the opposition and winning the ball from their DM and defender. Ram does it quite well too, but he always end up with a foul. Oscar's tackle and pressing in the opposition half is second to none in the Chelsea squad.

In our own half, we expect Matic to be a pressing midfielder. But higher up the pitch, it is the presence of Oscar and Costa that is pressing the opposition and winning the ball high up the pitch. Just like what Mou emphasized last season. His philosophy for us, is to win the ball up high in the opposition half, and launch our attack. It is Oscar's work rate and pressing that always wins him a place in Mou's starting 11. imho la.

This post has been edited by briantwj: Aug 20 2014, 10:17 PM

that is why i think he did ok for the last game. not great. decent game for his standard. not exceptional.

i dont think mikel or ramires suit our passing game (we pass a lot in last match). both mikel and ramires have limited range in their passing, not to mention poor first touch.

agree on oscar performance after mata departure. i am one of the guy from 'mata team' and keep on dwelling on 'if only we have mata, we could have win the game' last season. not once, not twice, but almost everytime when the team fail to perform.

hazard done pretty well imo. successfully dribble past numbers of defender, click well with our attacking dept, tracking back & cover for dave. same old hazrd.

for world cup performance, everyone from our contingent play poorly bar schurrle.

current squad good enough for me. got top class cover for each position. our 'second' team can challenge for top4 spot imo.

may i know which am/winger would u suggest to compliment our world class squad?

p/s: i think our defence quite shaky in the last game. cahill and terry both have their share of sloppy moment.

on a side note,

a - Oscar is one of Chelsea's three most successful tacklers last season
b - Oscar was the highest tackler of the World Cup
c - There were games last season when Oscar makes more successful tackles and interceptions on his own than the entire Chelsea backline

This is the type of AM that Mourinho wants, he wants a AM to win balls high up the pitch.

Read this

A very gud read imho. It clearly map out how and what type of football that Chelsea and Mourinho is playing.

Btw, dun watch the highlight. The highlight of our 1st goal didn't show Oscar's contribution. Iinm, it was Oscar's challenge from a header against a Burnley player that launched the attack. So he was also involved in the 1st goal. The highlights onli show starting from Cesc's backheel.

highlight

watch the 3rd video embedded. It showed the determination of Oscar to win the header (loose ball) against a Burnley player and head it to Cesc for his back heel. THat is Oscar's contribution. His contribution might not be as fancy as Fab's beautiful back heel, but it is still a contribution, albeit in an ugly way. This little things is what win games. Work rate. Oscar could choose not to challenge for the header and let Burnley launch an attack, but his work rate at the higher end of the pitch won us the header and leads to the equalizer.

This post has been edited by briantwj: Aug 20 2014, 10:45 PM

we need oscar to steal the ball from opponent,his defensive and workrate is better than mikel.

Oscar wasn't at the best in terms of creativity last game. But he's overall attributes are really good, so he is easily able to be a solid cog in passing moves. He was anti-Fab last game, as in positioning wise; when Cesc is advanced, Oscar drops; since Oscar's attacking wasn't great, so the vice versa wasn't noticable much.

His tackling is good, but he is no defensive player. He is the AM, not part of the primary or secondary defensive lines, so he won't be in position to clear or intercept balls. His job is to press players.

If someone asked me (and I possibly could the type to consider naming my first born after the Brazilian) whether Oscar was world class or the best in the league, I would say no. He is still behind the likes of Silva, Nasri, Mata etc. But in saying that, it doesn't mean even they can make Mou's team. As of now, he fulfills the workrate to be in the team and his level of attributes on the ball are higher than most players in the league. That's why he's playing. Now he needs to deliver in terms of influencing the game attacking wise, WHEN NEEDED that is. I don't think I would complain that there weren't enough creativity that game (i.e. first half that is). In the future, there maybe times when his influence would be needed, and whether he'll deliver or not.. my guess is as good as anybodies.