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On January 19 2021 03:26 Pandemona wrote: Haaland to Chelsea hilarious, i mean wtf Frank done to our board, he gets them to invest in all these amazing attacking talents for what lol. They can't all play if he continues to play his 4-3-3 system jesus lol. If I can make it work on football manager Frank can do it in real life.
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On January 18 2021 22:11 Liquid`Drone wrote: City's 7-2-0 past 9 games is good, but it's not like they had fantastic opposition. Draw vs united, a very impressive win away vs Chelsea and a 1-0 vs southampton are the only games vs top 10 teams - while it includes games vs 13. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19.
I mean, I might just have them as current league favorites myself, too. But I think it's really close between them, United and Liverpool. Maybe something like a 30% city 25% united 25% liverpool 20% any other team.
How convenient, just name the Top 3 teams now (barring middle-tier teams like Leicester, Everton) 
Go back a month ago, would you switch Tottenham and MU around? The table is so tight this year, league table position is deceiving. Personally, it's still a two-horse race between Liverpool and MC (60%). The other 37% evenly spread between MU, Tottenham, and Chelsea. Yes, I'm giving Arsenal, Leicester and Everton no more than 3% chance 
Liverpool and MC are more cohesive teams. The only reason why there's parity this year is due to COVID (and strict test and isolation rules - positive, you're out), and injuries (partly due to COVID due to less downtime between seasons). The other small factor why MU may spring a surprise is that they got knocked out in every other competition and have their full focus on EPL (less travelling, less fatigue, less risk of infection and injury, etc).
So even if Liverpool and MC don't win the league, it's purely because the unpredictable variables caused by COVID. In a normal season, they both have run riot (I would rate their combined chances higher at 75-80%).
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Northern Ireland25875 Posts
On January 18 2021 22:11 Liquid`Drone wrote: City's 7-2-0 past 9 games is good, but it's not like they had fantastic opposition. Draw vs united, a very impressive win away vs Chelsea and a 1-0 vs southampton are the only games vs top 10 teams - while it includes games vs 13. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19.
I mean, I might just have them as current league favorites myself, too. But I think it's really close between them, United and Liverpool. Maybe something like a 30% city 25% united 25% liverpool 20% any other team. It’s either going to be close all round, or a massacre, IMO anyway.
I can’t recall all the stats to hand, but Liverpool are something 19 points or something worse off than this point last season. The rest haven’t appreciably dropped off to any huge degree. Like it tends to be within a standard season to season fluctuation in fortunes.
City are round about where they were last year, but they had a bad year by their standards last year.
TLDR, the league is a bit more condensed and volatile but the usual suspects are about the same(ish) as last season. Bar Liverpool and Sheffield United being huge outliers, the current top 6 aren’t doing hugely different in performance to last year.
AKA it’s a bit like 2016 again where, as cool as Leicester winning and Spurs finishing fourth in a two horse race was, it was really the absence of a great team (looking at points) that made that possible. The difference this time is you have two great teams lurking.
If, and it’s a big if City or Liverpool can find their top gear they’re going to walk the league. Hope not though I’m quite enjoying this!
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On January 19 2021 11:08 RKC wrote:Show nested quote +On January 18 2021 22:11 Liquid`Drone wrote: City's 7-2-0 past 9 games is good, but it's not like they had fantastic opposition. Draw vs united, a very impressive win away vs Chelsea and a 1-0 vs southampton are the only games vs top 10 teams - while it includes games vs 13. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19.
I mean, I might just have them as current league favorites myself, too. But I think it's really close between them, United and Liverpool. Maybe something like a 30% city 25% united 25% liverpool 20% any other team. How convenient, just name the Top 3 teams now (barring middle-tier teams like Leicester, Everton)  Go back a month ago, would you switch Tottenham and MU around? The table is so tight this year, league table position is deceiving. Personally, it's still a two-horse race between Liverpool and MC (60%). The other 37% evenly spread between MU, Tottenham, and Chelsea. Yes, I'm giving Arsenal, Leicester and Everton no more than 3% chance  Liverpool and MC are more cohesive teams. The only reason why there's parity this year is due to COVID (and strict test and isolation rules - positive, you're out), and injuries (partly due to COVID due to less downtime between seasons). The other small factor why MU may spring a surprise is that they got knocked out in every other competition and have their full focus on EPL (less travelling, less fatigue, less risk of infection and injury, etc). So even if Liverpool and MC don't win the league, it's purely because the unpredictable variables caused by COVID. In a normal season, they both have run riot (I would rate their combined chances higher at 75-80%). youre giving united the same odds as tottenham and chelsea? wat.
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Norway28699 Posts
On January 19 2021 11:08 RKC wrote:Show nested quote +On January 18 2021 22:11 Liquid`Drone wrote: City's 7-2-0 past 9 games is good, but it's not like they had fantastic opposition. Draw vs united, a very impressive win away vs Chelsea and a 1-0 vs southampton are the only games vs top 10 teams - while it includes games vs 13. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19.
I mean, I might just have them as current league favorites myself, too. But I think it's really close between them, United and Liverpool. Maybe something like a 30% city 25% united 25% liverpool 20% any other team. How convenient, just name the Top 3 teams now (barring middle-tier teams like Leicester, Everton)  Go back a month ago, would you switch Tottenham and MU around? The table is so tight this year, league table position is deceiving. Personally, it's still a two-horse race between Liverpool and MC (60%). The other 37% evenly spread between MU, Tottenham, and Chelsea. Yes, I'm giving Arsenal, Leicester and Everton no more than 3% chance  Liverpool and MC are more cohesive teams. The only reason why there's parity this year is due to COVID (and strict test and isolation rules - positive, you're out), and injuries (partly due to COVID due to less downtime between seasons). The other small factor why MU may spring a surprise is that they got knocked out in every other competition and have their full focus on EPL (less travelling, less fatigue, less risk of infection and injury, etc). So even if Liverpool and MC don't win the league, it's purely because the unpredictable variables caused by COVID. In a normal season, they both have run riot (I would rate their combined chances higher at 75-80%).
United got the most points out of any team last season too after the signing of fernandes. While I agree that without injuries pool and city would prolly be a few points ahead of them, and united losing fernandes would kill their chances, I don't think a liverpool without van dijk really looks any more consistent than united without significant inuuries. And yeah the 20% any other team is supposed to be tottenham 15 chelsea everton leicester 5 arsenal 0. 😉
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Pandemona
Charlie Sheens House51493 Posts
On January 19 2021 09:35 Sermokala wrote:Show nested quote +On January 19 2021 03:26 Pandemona wrote: Haaland to Chelsea hilarious, i mean wtf Frank done to our board, he gets them to invest in all these amazing attacking talents for what lol. They can't all play if he continues to play his 4-3-3 system jesus lol. If I can make it work on football manager Frank can do it in real life. Haha yeah it seems to be that way in Frank's head as well xd
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On January 20 2021 03:41 Pandemona wrote:Show nested quote +On January 19 2021 09:35 Sermokala wrote:On January 19 2021 03:26 Pandemona wrote: Haaland to Chelsea hilarious, i mean wtf Frank done to our board, he gets them to invest in all these amazing attacking talents for what lol. They can't all play if he continues to play his 4-3-3 system jesus lol. If I can make it work on football manager Frank can do it in real life. Haha yeah it seems to be that way in Frank's head as well xd
Chelsea has really gone full Championship Manager / Fantasy Football with their signings this seasons. Not sure to what extent Frank is responsible for every one of them. I'm really surprised Roman agreed to sign the chequebook. Some of the big signings aren't famous or established enough to be a commercial hit. So I just don't get the logic?
Imagine if such a war-chest was available to Mourinho (v 2), Hiddink or Ancelotti...
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On January 21 2021 09:44 RKC wrote:Show nested quote +On January 20 2021 03:41 Pandemona wrote:On January 19 2021 09:35 Sermokala wrote:On January 19 2021 03:26 Pandemona wrote: Haaland to Chelsea hilarious, i mean wtf Frank done to our board, he gets them to invest in all these amazing attacking talents for what lol. They can't all play if he continues to play his 4-3-3 system jesus lol. If I can make it work on football manager Frank can do it in real life. Haha yeah it seems to be that way in Frank's head as well xd Chelsea has really gone full Championship Manager / Fantasy Football with their signings this seasons. Not sure to what extent Frank is responsible for every one of them. I'm really surprised Roman agreed to sign the chequebook. Some of the big signings aren't famous or established enough to be a commercial hit. So I just don't get the logic? Imagine if such a war-chest was available to Mourinho (v 2), Hiddink or Ancelotti... Villas Boas signed Lukaku, de Bruyne, Cahill, Juan Mata, Raul Meireles, Courtois, Bamford all combined for less than Havertz lul. Imagine him with Frank's budget
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I see a lot of discussion about the next manager of Chelsea, but has there been any actual word yet? Does Lampard still have a game or two left to turn things around somehow or is he just sitting there until the paperwork is done?
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I dont know how quick things go at Chelsea but 8. place in the league and out of the EL and CL ranks should be a warning sign.
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Pandemona
Charlie Sheens House51493 Posts
Well Frank for Roman is like the ultimate because Roman loves Frank for what he did and achieved at the club, they classify eachother as "friends" which is unsual for an owner/player relationship right.
When Frank did what he did and got top 4 with a team that didn't look like it could and then he said sign me x y and z, Roman said sure here you go, i want you to succeed i will give you everything to do so. The other managers have all clashed with Roman more than been his friend etc etc right plus Roman has also mellowed in his tenure too.
During the era of AVB though he was not in charge of signings he had no say because we were going down the director of football route, all those players listed above were signed by Michael Emenalo's say so, especially the likes of Lukaku, DeBruyne and Tibo.
Frank's future comes down to people being available to take over now, they want to give him time but they also don't want to but have little choice. Tuchel does NOT fit with Chelsea hierarchy due to how he clashes with boards wherever he goes and in reality has not been a world class championship manager like say Conte or Mourinho were at the times of their appointments. The best fit is Naglesmann and there is no way we are getting him mid season, so they need to find an iterim and work towards getting a Naglesmann in which again takes a lot of time.
I think if Lampard wins in the fa cup which he should easily do, then somehow beats Burnley and Wolves he will probably keep his job till the end of the season or until it becomes even worse than it is now. If we look poor in the FA Cup and then draw/lose in the league they will be forced to remove him though.
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Nick Pope is an absolute champ this half so far
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I'd say Burnley's best player has been Origi.
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Pandemona
Charlie Sheens House51493 Posts
No idea how he misses that, that was insane miss, why on earth he trying to smash that top corner? Relax, place it!!
Also great handbags at end of half, Klopp trying to shout at Dyche haha, not the guy to mess with lol. Fabinho rightfully booked but that was about all it deserved.
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Norway28699 Posts
Burnley is difficult to score on, though. Even though they've lost 3 of the past 4 games prior to this, they only conceded 3 goals in those matches.
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This is shaping up to be one of the most impressive upsets I've seen in recent memory. Pope has done such an incredible job tonight and these Burnley players are giving an absolute defending masterclass
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Pandemona
Charlie Sheens House51493 Posts
Oh my lol Liverpool what you doing!! 380 minutes without a goal now and their unbeaten record gone! Crazy league be crazy
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Lalalaland34495 Posts
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