[Archived] Chelsea V Rovers Preview

[colin]

Saturday 24th October KO 17:30

Well, after the events on Sunday it's down to the mundane reality that is The Premiership. No passion, no local history-rich derby, just a sharp reminder of the gulf between the haves & the have-nots in 2009. After a fresh & crumbly Lancashire it's a Kraft cheese slice between two slices of ASDA economy white sliced.

If you need to know all about Chelsea FC then may I, rather obviously, point you in this direction:

Chelsea on wikipedia

Premier clubs now owned by filthy-rich people, who have no obvious connection with the club, are

Birmingham City, Portsmouth, Sunderland, Manchester City, Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea, Aston Villa, Fulham and West Ham United. That's 10 out of the 20 Premier Clubs. Arsenal are on the edge with Enos Stanley "Stan" Kroenke looking likely. Perhaps it goes without saying that all these owners are foreign. Perhaps obviously so, as Steve Gibson & the Jacks - Hayward & Walker would never contemplate buying any other clubs then the ones they did.

The Premiership is more and more looking like a "look at the size of my yatch moored at San Tropez" competition. There's a handy little round-up here

The Blackpool Gazette

Lower down the leagues Notts County & QPR are under scrutiny. As are Dirty Leeds where Cuddly Ken Bates has been *ahem* making mistakes in court about his ownership.

Chelsea was the first, in 2003 & here he is.

Abramovich on Wikipedia

It's a massive great ego-boost. He's got the yachts; the jets; the properties; no doubt fending off the wet-lipped lovlies left right & centre, so what better than a London football club and have 50,000 people chanting your name every week or so. It can't be for making money because he's poured £600 million into the place.

Although Peter Kenyon (soon to depart Chief Executive at Chelsea,) talked about "global branding" as some kind of business growth target, I reckon it's RA wanting to see Chelsea (owner RA) shirts on millions of far eastern backs. He's a kind of unshaven Ming The Merciless for the 21st century.

Some take-overs have been for potential money-making reasons, some for ego. If you go back to the Blackpool Gazette list you can tick them all one or the other. Randy Learner's a bit of a puzzle though.

And without much of a doubt Abramovich has changed Chelsea from just another football club to the second most unpleasant and disliked football club on the planet (*1.)

Our main link with the Chelsea millions is that they bought Damien Duff by waving vast amounts of the stuff. Damien then spent a considerable number of hours on the Chelsea bench, dozing lightly and trying to imagine how much money he was earning. Oh well. Let's live with that one. We weren't the only ones. Wayne Bridge; Andrei Shevechenko; Shaun Wright-Phillips & Scott Parker. There's lots more players that they vacuumed up for vast amounts and then let go. We got Graeme le Saux and Ian Pierce from Chelsea in 1993 for bugger-all money and they both won premiership gongs with us. Ha!

Ticket prices for the game will be £44 or £47. Basically that's just under a quarter of the price of my Season Ticket in The Blackburn End. It'll be £6.00 for a pint of lager (*2) or a "reclaimed-meat burger-type food product (*3)to enhance your Chelsea match day experience" The match programme will cost £7.50 and will consist of photo-shopped pictures of Frank Lampard looking slim. We could do that with Dunny, but the technology is not quite that advanced yet. Although you could biro a picture of him on an inflated balloon and then let some air out.

On Sky after the game, Fat Frank Lampard's cousin Jamie Redknapp will be describing him as a "Top top player" whilst gripping really hard onto the arms of his TV studio chair and looking angry while his reproductive organs are being stressed by his all too tight trousers.

Some lovely statistics

Our past ten years at Stamford Bridge:

2008-2009 L 2-0

2007-2008 D 0-0 (Shevschenko kicked Chris Samba in the head in this game. If it had been Hendry or Moran it wouldn't have mattered, they would have got up in an "Igor" fashion and just carried on. "I'll juthst sthich it up later mathster") (*4)

2006-2007 L 3-0

2005-2006 L 4-2

2004-2005 L 4-0

2003-2004 D 2-2

2002-2003 W 2-1 (Dwight Yorke scored after 86 minutes; Dunn scored in injury time and Jimmy Floyd Hasslebaink got Chelsea's right at the end)

2001-2002 D 0-0

1998-1999 D 1-1

Chelsea very rarely lose at Stamford Bridge in the league .

Season 01-02 lost 4; 02-03 lost 2; 03-04 lost 3; 04-05 lost 0; 05-06 lost 0; 06-07 lost 0; 07-08 lost 0; 08-09 lost 2.

That's 11 in 152 games! We were one of them.

My main & painful memory of Chelsea is them stuffing us in the 1987-1988 play-offs . 2-0 at Stamford Bridge & 1-4 at Ewood Park. I recall Kerry Dixon did much of the damage.

Chelsea results this year:

15th August Chelsea 2 - 1 Hull

18th August Sunderland 1 - 3 Chelsea

23rd August Fulham 0 - 2 Chelsea

29th August Chelsea 3 - 0 Burnley

12th September Stoke 1 - 2 Chelsea

20th September Chelsea 3 - 0 Tottenham

26th September Wigan 3 - 1 Chelsea (who saw that one coming ?)

4th October Chelsea 2 - 0 Liverpool

16th October Villa 2 - 1 Chelsea

If you are going to Stamford Bridge, the I'm sure the rest of us wish the both of you a good evening out.

As 1864 Roverite so eloquently put it on another thread "Unless Rovers are ever needing a point to win the league OR it is a neutral venue for a cup semi final, I wouldnt set foot in this hovel ever again, its far too expensive, the beer is crap and the clientel around the area are way too far up their own ar$es."

If one of you can smuggle in a sniper's rifle and actually shoot Drogber when he is in the penalty area, so that he goes down clutching his head as though he has been shot, it probably would be a bit of relief. (*5)

John Motson: (imagine the voice) "And Drogber has gone there, down clutching his head as thought he's been shot. My word.... Oh! he actually has been shot in the head this time I fancy. Now that's a turn-up for the books"

There is one thing I'd gladly swap with Chelsea.

They have as "Honoury Life President" someone who is widely respected & admired throughout the film world as an actor & director. Take a bow Lord Richard Attenborough CBE.

Our "Honoury Life President" is Margaret Thatcher.

Footnotes

*1 Guess

*2(Q) What's the similarity between a pint of lager at Stamford Bridge & having sex in a punt?

(A) They're both fecking close to water.

The old ones are the best.....

*3 Mechanically recovered: gristle, intestine, thorax, and udders, put into an industrial blender with stale bread from the Kwik Save out-of-date bin. Served on a delighful bun with a small but perfectly formed gerkin. With a commemorative Chelsea FC napkin for you to take home and treasure.

*4 Terry Pratchett readers will understand. The rest of you need to read Terry Pratchett

*5 That's a joke, not an incitement to shoot Didier Drogber in the head. Resist the temptation. Although.........no. Resist.

[colin]

Just to reply to myself there is an excellent article by the ever reliable John Nicholson who writes for football365 on the plight of Liverpool FC, currently suffering the ownership of Gillett & Hicks here

[philipl]

Great preview Colin. Chelsea look to be going through a dodgy patch at the moment and we could rattle them at the Bridge whilst their self-belief not to say defensive organisation is suspect. I'd just lover to see John Terry jumping up and down on the goal line like a three year old as Jason Roberts wheels away having put one away but I think we are going to be a couple of players short of the quality needed to disrupt them.

Our defence is probably getting strong enough to withstand an Anelka/Drogba assault for 90 minutes but not behind a midfield in which Nzonzi is the only player you can rely on to put in an effective shift. Dunny can and will cause problems but there is no forward in the absence of Di Santo who is going to really cause Chelsea headaches. We will get a chance or two but it will need Benni at his clinical best to put them away and I doubt Benni will do anything other than warm the bench.

Chelsea to win 2-0 on current form, 4-0 if they click into gear.

The Liverpool article is interesting- Gillett and Hick will bail out to the Saudi if administration is a serious possibility. What looks on the cards though is Liverpool could be inaugural winners of the Europa League and finish well outside the first four places in the Prem this season.

[Steve Moss]

I am feeling good about this one. We looked great against Arsenal (well, for the first 60 minutes, anyway) and Aston Villa. If Sam and Co. show up and act like a club with some fighting spirit, we might get a tie. Saturday's game certainly has Chelsea in a black mood, maybe we can capitalize on that.

I'm predicating a 2-2 draw. Failing that, as a consolation prize I would love Dunn to cause Terry to have another hissy fit. Go Rovers!

And Terry Pratchett rocks. Read him if you haven't. His most recent is a spoof on football.

[Tom]

3-0 Chelsea but I'm not worried about it in honesty, anything from the next two will be classed as 'free' points in Sams mind I imagine.

Time to give Kalinic a go, not much to lose by throwing him in and a goal against some of the best would be a huge boost for him. Otherwise i expect it will be Samba up top with Nelsen and Givet at the back.

[Amo]

I think Philip hit the nail on the head. This is a opportune time to rub salt in Chelsea's wounds, but with Di Santo missing, you can be guaranteed that Roberts will be trudging up front in his absence.

[mellison24]

I expect zilch from this game, so we ought to give players a run out whilst maintaining a potential winning team (based on Sam's Formation):

------------Robbo-----------

Chimbonda-Samba-Nelsen-Givet

-----Emerton---N'Zonzi(Grella if fit, just to see how he does)

Hoilett----Dunn---Diouf/Pedersen

----------Kalinic-----------

This gives players a run out, and with a few surprises could get something against chelski (with Hoilett and Kalinic being unknown quantities as of yet in the premiership). I may be tempted to put McCarthy in there over Kalinic if it's too early for the latter to come in.

Thoughts?

[colin]

Great preview Colin. Chelsea look to be going through a dodgy patch at the moment and we could rattle them at the Bridge whilst their self-belief not to say defensive organisation is suspect. I'd just lover to see John Terry jumping up and down on the goal line like a three year old as Jason Roberts wheels away having put one away

Thanks Philipl. Your hope of John Terry having a hissy-fit one the goal line probably equates with mine of Linda Lusardi pitching up on my doorstep with her car broke.

Let's dream on though shall we?

[philipl]

There could be a big benefit to Rovers giving Chelsea a fright followed up by a stronger Rovers giving the Mancs an even bigger fright.

A Di Santo-led Rovers might come to be appreciated by Chelski as a more than decent bet for taking points of their title rivals when they all visit Ewood in the New Year.

If Rovers' performance on Saturday can convince Ancelotti that Di Santo is more use to them at Ewood than at Stamford Bridge, a good show could have a double benefit.

Its dirty, not sporting, we'd hate someone to do it against us, but,

Just hoping...

[dcbrfc]

Don't hold out much hope for this un. Got my rip-off tickets this morning.

Who's going?

[Mr. E]

wait...why is di Santo not playing?

[Jan]

wait...why is di Santo not playing?

It's a Premier League rule now. You can't play against the team you're loaned from. It came in at the beginning of either this or last season. It was to stop all the "will he, won't he". So they just said "no".

[G Somerset Rover]

Here's Mr.Nixon's article on Di Santo's happiness at the club:

Franco

He wants us to beat Chelsea this weekend

[joey_big_nose]

I expect zilch from this game, so we ought to give players a run out whilst maintaining a potential winning team (based on Sam's Formation):

------------Robbo-----------

Chimbonda-Samba-Nelsen-Givet

-----Emerton---N'Zonzi(Grella if fit, just to see how he does)

Hoilett----Dunn---Diouf/Pedersen

----------Kalinic-----------

This gives players a run out, and with a few surprises could get something against chelski (with Hoilett and Kalinic being unknown quantities as of yet in the premiership). I may be tempted to put McCarthy in there over Kalinic if it's too early for the latter to come in.

Thoughts?

I would probably go for this team with a few adjustments - Nelsen has played his way back into the team and Jacobsen has maybe played his way out so agree with the back four. Diouf had a poor game against the Dingles while Ped had a good one so maybe I would stick with the Ped out left. If Grella is fit I would start Grella alongside NZonzi and play Emerton wide right - he is defensively solid which is important for this fixture. Hoilett can be used as a sub.

Massive issue is who we use as a striker out of Kalinic, Roberts or McCarthy. Personally Benni will get over run so I don't see him as an option. Roberts is a real ball ache becuase, frankly, we like using the long ball as an outball - but Jase cannot win the ball in the air. He is decent enough if he is back to goal and it comes to feet. He can sometimes do a decent job rolling the defender. But are we going to be able to get that ball to him consistently?I would say, on recent evidence, not.

So the main question is how much weight training has Kalinic done? Is he strong enough to cope with Terry and Alex on his own? That he was not on the bench against the dingles suggests he still doing work.

I suppose Sam, seeing as none of our available strikers suit the 4231 system, could change to 442. But with Dunn in the form he is in now would you move him? I don't think thats an option to start but if we get no change we could change shape during the game.

Therefore I think we are going to see Roberts sadly - but I suppose a crumb of comfort is that arguably his best game in a Rovers shirt was that semi final at OT against the pensioners....

Maybe we can have a reprisal?

[1864roverite]

Chelsea away, makes you want to cringe thinking which Chelsea will turn out.

Will it be the fast flowing Chelsea side, full of skill, flicks and goals or

Will it be he sulky Chelsea, slick passing till the 18yrd box then nothing whilst at the other end Cech has a nightmare ?

Rovers have to be positive no matter what. Chelsea dont like it when teams come out to play.

The main problem I have is this.

Andrews versus Essien

NZonzi versus Fat Frank

I will try and enhoy a few beers watching it in the club.

3-0 defeat

[roversfan1]

If we can keep this within 2 then Ill be happy enough - its a tough game due to the sheer gulf in qaulity between the 2 sides. I just want to see the Rovers players give everything they have, not be scared or intimidated and play for the shirt and if they do that and we lose then fair enough!

[RibbleValleyRover]

3-0 Chelsea, expecting a fightback/backlash from them after some poor performances. I'd be tempted to bring in Kalinic for this game, perhaps alongside Hoilett? They seem to link up pretty well the times they have played together.

I'm sure Sam will be viewing this game as "anything from it will be a bonus". The wins against Villa and Burnley give us the opportunity to go into these games with nothing to lose, might as well give it a real go and see what happens.

[Rover95]

Great preview - made me laugh out loud!

For games like this, I just hope we don't get hammered. However, we should go into the game full of confidence and have a go. I'd also like to see Hoilett - he looks lively and I think could cause them problems.

God help our central midfield though......

[philipl]

Just noticed Chelsea are at home to Atletico Madrid tomorrow night. Hopefully it will be a toughy for them but I doubt it.

[LeChuck]

Probably the only game where I've said this so far this season...but I really hope Kalinic doesn't start. We're unlikely to score, probably won't create much, and he would probably see very little of the ball...starting him would just be giving people a stick to beat him with.

[jonv]

Enjoyable read. Thanks for that .

Can't see us getting much from this game, I just hope we maintain damage control. Can see it being 4-1 Chelsea, but who knows we're overdue of a close game against the top 4

Can't see Kalinic getting a look in. You'd think BFS will have Roberts up front on his own to provide nothing but a nuisance for Terry and co. Sadly the official will blow every time he touches them and it'll prove to be a frustrating evening.

[colin]

I am feeling good about this one. We looked great against Arsenal (well, for the first 60 minutes, anyway)

Your "reality filter" needs the fluff removing. It's blocked.

(this was a lighthearted commen, & not intended to cause any offence)

[Ossydave]

Well I'm trying to think positive.........

Chelsea have struggled to defend set pieces this season, I think Cech is very suspect on crosses and has been since his head injury. If we are to get even a draw we need to exploit that weakness.

The lads must be buzzing after the Dingle game, and team spirit seems very good so let's just give it a good go.

[Steve Moss]

Your "reality filter" needs the fluff removing. It's blocked.

Not offended in the slightest. But I thought the team performed very well for the 1st 2/3 of the game and were contending for a win. The wheels feel off when the ref denied an obvious foul (and my opinion of EPL referee's has dropped considerably since) and Dunn was removed.

But I'll watch the game with beer in hand and hope for a good result.

[Mr. E]

It's a Premier League rule now. You can't play against the team you're loaned from. It came in at the beginning of either this or last season. It was to stop all the "will he, won't he". So they just said "no".

Kind of silly though. Di Santo leaves Chelsea on loan because they don't let him play for them, and now he can't play against them either.