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In Toon Today: Average Joe   

9 years ago
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Welcome to Chelsea…

Who Manages Them?  

It is ironic that a Manager who attempts to manipulate the media so much should have been misquoted to such a defining extent in his first ever English management press conference.

Jose Mourinho never said he was “THE SPECIAL ONE”, he said when commenting on his status as a football manager that as a European Champion he was “A SPECIAL ONE”.

He’s proved it since in football, he’s got more titles than the House of Lords and he’s never far from a story. This season has seen him have a shoving match with Arsene Wenger and a spat with Manuel Pelligrini, who called Chelsea a “small team” over their defensive tactics, which is all part of Mourinho’s mastery, unsettling the opposition.

The reality of Chelsea’s playing style is that Mourinho just doesn’t care, he just wants to win and he picks the style which he believes is the best way to win.

“I’m a football man. I respect different ways of setting out your team. You can play 10 at the back or you can play 10 at the front. It doesn’t matter. What matters is the result.”

Of course his best spat of the season so far was when he tried shake hands with Paul Lambert and Roy Keane a minute or so before the end of the recent game between Chelsea and Villa. The Villa pair reacted angrily, feeling it was an insult to their efforts to concede defeat before the final whistle but Mourinho seemed to mean no offence in the gesture whereas Roy Keane probably thinks ‘sporting behaviour’ is a Portuguese Second Division team.

Mourinho is under pressure though and being top of the league won’t change that, his last season at Chelsea was a trophyless one, only the blues third in the last decade. Despite his protestations that his “little horses” couldn’t win the title, Mourinho perhaps successfully deflected away the same criticisms that were more prominently levelled against Liverpool, that perhaps last year they should have won the title. It is unlikely he’ll still be at Chelsea if they haven’t won anything by May 2015 and he can have no excuses this season, his “little horses” will have grown into big asses.

Who have They Bought?             

£32million buy from Atletico Madrid, Diego Costa is a multitude of cats. Former manager Diego Simeone once said of him “Another scratch doesn’t hurt a tiger,” when Costa had split his shin open to the bone when colliding with a post, in a collision which would have seen Michael Owen in the morgue.

Geographically speaking, South American Costa would have to be a Jaguar, a lone hunter, spreading fear wherever he goes, strong like Drogba before him, the type of centre forward Mourinho loves. Costa is only a tiger some of the time though. When he elbows someone in the face or kicks them in the head he’s more of a kitten than a tiger. Costa should play today, as well as £30million ex-Barca squad player Cesc Fabregas and on the bench should be new signings left back Filipe Luis and strikers Didier Drogba & Loic Remy.

Who Have We Seen Before:     

£11million Loic Remy, bought from QPR, who he never really wanted to play for but signed for anyway because he wanted to play for them more than he wanted to play for us. When QPR got relegated he signed for us on loan, but he didn’t really want to play for us. He scored 14 times for us in 26 games but sometimes he didn’t play for us because he didn’t want to play for us, he was saving himself for France.

Then he didn’t sign for us when he left QPR, he signed for Chelsea. He wanted to sign for Liverpool but he failed his medical. According to the Liverpool medical team he had a wallet where his guts should have been.

A Special Mention For:

John Terry will have his full Chelsea kit on today, just like he did when he lifted the Champions League trophy in 2012, only this time he’ll be playing in the match rather than wearing his kit under his suit. Don’t worry John, it’s all about you today.

Are We Going to Win?

Well the Mackems recently stopped Chelsea from scoring and the Blues ‘park the bus’ tactics that are so successful against the likes of Man City and Arsenal generally don’t work as well as teams that are parking their bus too. All of which doesn’t make the game sound like it’ll be a classic but NUFC have definitely been more comfortable and won more games playing counter attacking football, something which has worked against Chelsea in the past.

(To feature like Ben, send in your articles for our website to contribute@themag.co.uk)

Chelsea also may have a defensive headache to overcome, literally, Gary Cahill may be forced out of the game after Wednesday’s concussion and the suspended Nemanja Matic will mean Chelsea are forced to change a defensive unit which has been stable so far this season.

6 foot 4 inch Matic will be a particular miss, Chelsea rarely concede when he plays and the likes of Sissoko should be able to burst more easily past lightweight Cesc and the foul-a-thon that is now Ramires. Add to that Eden Hazard’s recent reluctance to score away from home and last season’s bogey stat, that last season 5 of their 6 defeats came before a CL game, and we are in with a shout.

One thing is for sure, if we defend as badly as Spurs did on Wednesday we will lose, and if we play as defensively as the Mackems did last Saturday then we might as well lose, but we have oen major advantage to play on: A SPECIAL ONE has never won a Premier League game in Toon.

Before the game Mourinho said:

“Let’s try (and win) tomorrow. It is difficult and a difficult stadium to play in. There are some stadiums where when they see Chelsea shirts they have the game of their lives and when they play against other teams they look like they are playing friendlies.”

Well Jose, Chelsea normally beat us at SJP when you’re not manager. Perhaps it’s not the Chelsea shirts that make us play the game of our lives, perhaps we just don’t think you’re special Jose.

We’ve already got a St James, we don’t need an average Joe.

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