Premier League: Middlesbrough 0 - 5 Chelsea

I won!!! first to comment, err well great game.

Stayed up to watch it, very impressive performance but Boro were very poor, that said you can only beat whats in front of you and hopefullY that will be the case next week.

I find it utterly incredible that the football establishment including the BBC MOTD see fit to pour accolades on Liverpool for coming back once more from behind at home to Wigan who only won it once Wigan went down to 10 men and at home! yet Chelsea who showed a masterclass without a heap of players away at a historically difficult game does not get the headlines in the BBC website and is not the first match shown on the BBC MOTD! it is quite disgracefull and shows the anti Chelsea or any other team who challenges the established old names in this country. Liverpool are riding their luck , it is not a case of they are great just playing badly, they were 2-1 down at home with 20 min to go until the wigan player was off. We have to beat the scousers next week, we just have to, I dont want a draw and my god a loss would be sickening against them, so no Scholari coming out saying as he did against man-u and tottenham after the games at the bridge " well they are a top team" rubbish. Anything other than a win will feel like a loss. And may i say, really well done to all the boys today not just in the win but a fabulous play, something which this effing media wont give us the due credit for that's for sure!!

Fuck em all. we are gonna win the league and i dont care if they dont praise us.

Another great performance from our 'reserve' side. This Premier League lark must seem easy if you're Big Phil.

GOOD
1. Performance - 5-0 away from home, and that was after we'd wasted 3 great chances and stopped playing after 70 mins. It's an ominous sign for the rest of the PL that we can play like this. I'm starting to get the same feeling i had in Jose's first year. I watch our games expecting a win, whereas under Avram i just hoped that we didn't have another nightmare 4-4. The fact that we got so close last season must tell us all that we're bound to win at least 1 trophy this year. Our attacking play, movement and passing is improving by the game. It was already impressive at the start of the season, but now it's scarily good.
2. Clean sheet - It's now 6 games since we last conceded and this only adds to the same feeling i had in 2004/5. We look watertight at the back and no goals conceded in the second half this season is a great record.
3. Midfield - Mikel and Lamps have been ever-presents and their great understanding is plain to see. But the real star was Belletti. He may have been one of the worst RBs ever at Chelsea but in midfield, he's a revelation. Another long range stunner worthy of his performance.
4. Lamps - His performance was worthy of the MOTM award, but he's in such great form that he'd win it every week, so it's right that Belletti got one. I said it after Villa that on current form he should be in the running for the World Player of the Year award. Awesome.
5. Records - I do again get the same 2004/5 feeling when we broke every PL record going. We could beat Arsenal's 49 game unbeaten run, our 95 points total, 13 goals conceded, 26 clean sheets, 100 games at home unbeaten and most importantly win the quad to put Fergie in his place. Anything is possible. In Scolari we trust.

BAD:
1. Boro - Truly awful. At 5-0 we stopped the humiliation and at the end, Scolari apologetically held up his hands to the fans in embarrassment...

2. Liverpool - The fact that they've got the same number of points as us, gives people the illusion that they're somehow on the same level as us. But the praise they've been getting for their 'characterful' comebacks is a sham. It's not a good thing having to rely on last minute ricochets against 10 men to win games. You can bet that soon we'll be hearing that it's the 'sign of champions' that they continue to scrape wins against the likes of Wigan. But they're a 2 man side who've lucked their way to second (unwilling to say joint top). As many have said, next Sunday is a must win. No playing for a draw and i hope that the home-record doesn't prevent us from going for the win, as it did against Spurs. We won't be able to repeat this type of free-flowing show as Rafa will park the bus and use his obsession with tactics to stifle us. Expect a 0-0 for long stretches and the game will come down to 1 or 2 high-pressure chances (not Anelka's speciality).
3. Media - I've never gone in for this media conspiracy against Chelsea but the fact that Liverpool and Utd are the headline grabbers ahead of us is a joke. If Gerrard or Rooney had masterminded a 5-0 away victory as Lamps did, the media would be drooling for weeks. But as it's Chelsea, it's only because Boro were shit that we won!
4. Cudicini - Not a big point, but his weird interpretation of the back-pass rule is annoying. He thinks that any touch back to him off any foot is a back-pass and rushes into a panicked clearance.
5. Graham Poll - LINK

"I can't condone booing any player but struggle to condemn the reaction to Ashley Cole last weekend. A product of the age of excessive wages and player behaviour. He shows little respect for officials and has abused attempts to manage him with snide comments. For some reason, referees, managers, the majority of fans and even, it seems, his lovely wife Cheryl, tolerate Cole’s excesses."

Poll's the definition of a c*nt!

I cant stop admiring Belletti's goal. Its the 3rd time he's done it. WE WANT MORE!

Habs.....

What a twunt Poll is....... Intereting to note that in yesterday's papers his former understudy at Arsenal, Justin Hoyte, said what a wonderful bloke Ashley is and that he always went out of his way to make time for him and to help him out.

Interesting that we got no headlines, and a big shame that both Arsenal and Liverpool got out of jail. I really hope we pants them next weekend, and show them to be the pretenders that they really are.

Still have no time for Anelka as a goalscorer, but his awarness is excellent and he creates chances for others with his movement.

Belletti was never as poor as some on here made out at Right Back, and his performances so far in midfield have been very impressive this year. Scolari clearly knows how to get the best out of him, and it doesn't seem to matter which midfield we play, they seem to dominate.

Well done Chelsea....only downside for me was that they did not go on withthe job after the 70th minute, as we could really have had 7 or 8.

Completely out-classed the opposition in consecutive league games. If we'd wanted it we could have scored 8 but we were right to save our strength.

Football is incredibly simple - pass and move - but I haven't seen us do it like this before.

"Belletti was never as poor as some on here made out at Right Back"

I agree with you, Greenlight. He wasn't that bad. But there were maybe three or four matches where he was out classed at right-back, a liability, and these tend to stick in fans' minds. That said, compare him to Bosingwa and he just isn't in the same league, so to speak.

He's a bloody good utility player, though. It's a shame he isn't a few years younger.

Agreed with the comments on Belletti - I think as a utility player he fits the bill but yesterday in midfield he was outstanding and even the pundits on MOTD singled him out.

I too am sick of the 'if Chelsea were good, the other team were poor' headlines and soundbites but all we can do lets the team carry on winning and churning out good results. I made it only too clear that Popeye wasn't my first choice but am only too happy to sit down and eat a nice big slice of humble pie and admit he's a class act.

A year ago we were wondering what had hit us with the sudden departure of Jose, still our greatest ever manager, but his combative and adversarial style and fortress mentality was more stressful to live with and his increasingly fractious relationships with the authorities seemed to pander to an 'enfant terrible' persona that he was only too happy to engender. Popeye, until now has been a model of calmness, twinkle eyed humour and steely determination - of course if we get a few bad results then we'll see how he copes but his international grounding seems to have served him well in coping with the goldfish bowl of Premiership and specifically Chelsea media attention. His pre-match comments refusing to whine about injuries from internationals showed the class of the man when compared to Wenger, Ferguson and the biggest cry baby of all, Tubby Benitez. Popeye is a very far cry from Avram Grant in every respect and a very welcome development.

Personally I'm happy with the lack of headlines or media spotlight and if we carry on quietly, graciously as we are then that suits me down to the ground.

Just a note on the amount of determination that Malouda had on taking that run to score the rebound from the goal post. Just Great!

There's certainly a different feel about the club at present, everything seems at peace, and the media although not totally converted yet are becoming a little more friendly towards us.

I hope our form continues on Wednesday and more importantly next Sunday, I'm sure we all want the Liverpool game to be a footballing lesson against them. I will admit their new found resilience has made people sit up and take note, but when you look at it a bit more, they seem to be riding their luck an awful lot. Three consecutive games they've had a player sent off against them, and they've come from behind on four occassions in the last 5 mins.

Some may say that's the sign of a championship winning team, it may be, but this is early in the season, and I would bet top dollar that the luck of sending off's they've had recently isn't going to continue, or their late goals.

There's no doubt we're playing with a swagger at the moment, it sort of reminds me of those days back in the 70's with the likes of Osgood Cooke Hudson, etc where everyone loved us because we played attractive football, although we won very little. At least today we have that feel good attitude to our play with one very important factor a "bloody winning mentality" and we can thank Jose for that.

I think I can safely say I was one of those who defended Belletti and wanted him to remain as a midfielder :}

With so many players missing we cruised to a 5-0 away win.

Quite an achievment.

(Malouda played well, linking up the play, even though he messed up a few good opportunities. And Anelka looked a little pacier than in recent games.)

Liverscum with no Torres should be no problem

KTBFFH

Can I ask for some help from blog members who live abroad? I subscribe to Chelsea Plus, which I use to download the highlight clips if the game is not shown here in the USA. According to the Chelsea Plus website, I should be able to access Chelsea TV on my computer, and so watch entire games. But every time I try, it says that Chelsea TV is "currently off the air", even though the schedule suggests it ought to be playing. Any ideas? I assume the times shown on the schedule are BST or GMT.

I'd really like to watch the whole game against 'Boro since it sounds as though our dominance went well beyond just the goals.

Chris - I'm a UK subscriber to Chelsea Plus and have just tried to access live programming via a US-based proxy server (the site uses geo IP location to work out where in the world you are).

The Chelsea TV schedule on chelseafc.com lists programmes all day today LINK but a message on Chelsea Plus says that live programming starts at 20:00 today and ends at 02:00 BST (Mon - Sat listed as 10:00 - 02:00).

I will try again at 20:00 today to see if I can access live streaming.

Stoke 1-0 up Rottenham down to 10 men all seems to be well in the Universe, can things get any better? :-)

Don't worry, it's a nailed on certainty that Torres will make a miraculous recovery in time for Sunday's match.

Lampard, Ballack and Drogba nominated for the Ballon d'Or. Cristiano Ronaldo's a nailed on certainty to win it, though. LINK

Not sure it can get much better than this - we're outstanding and Spurs have lost again, two players sent off and the Stoke fans were forced to buy Spurs tickets when they bought their Chelsea tickets, which very much puts Spurs in their place as a B movie for the main event.

How did we only get 1 point against these jokers?

@ Mark

Stoke fans were forced to buy Spurs tickets when they bought their Chelsea
tickets

I think that little gem on the Sky commentary amused me almost as much as the result itself.

Jose's Inter demolished Roma in front of 82000 4-0!! tonight. maybe good omen for us this week. by all accounts the attacking play was breathtaking all goals from open play and now top of the league by two points. if we meet jose in the CL i think it will be the most watched/anticipated match! will be fascinating to say the least. maybe jose can knock liverpool out of the CL for us hehe!

On the basis that in Radio 5 Live World this morning the big news was that Manure were up to fourth, I now climb the wooden hill in the expectation that tomorrows headline will be that they've now dropped to 5th, that is they are being kept out of the CL places by Hull City (I know they have a game in hand but like the armless man said when he was found with his dick in a melon, you've got to get your fun where you can)

Haven't seen the highlights yet but checked out the goals. It all sounds too good to be true winning 5 nil away at Boro and with 7 first team players injured, although I hear Deco got a run at the end of the game once the scoring was done.

One thing that should have opposing teams really worried is the fact most of our goals are coming from midfield. Drogba's injury and the fact Anelka is not a Drogba type player appears to be working to our advantage. The goals are coming from attacking midfielders who are rotating and interchanging at will. This kind of goal threat is probably the hardest to defend against and augers well for the rest of the season. When Drogba is back fit then he will offer another goal threat but lets hope we continue to play such a fluid game when attacking and not resort to the long ball approach when Drogba is playing. With all this focus on fluent attacking but we should forget or underestimate the way the team defends once the ball is lost.

I remember being pleasantly surprised when Scolari was appointed and felt this was the best option available. But like others I have been very surprised by how quickly he has stamped his own style on the team and how quickly the players have responded.

The future is looking very rosy and after last years dreadfully dull football this year is an absolute revelation... may it continue...

KTBFFH

@11- Chelseatony- I too am sick of the "Chelsea aren't good, everyone else is poor" reviews. I suppose the next week will really show whether this is the case, or whether we take Roma and 'pool out behind the woodshed.

Again, I just don't think the media scrutiny will get to Big Phil. I honestly believe that he held the toughest job media-wise in football. He was the manager of a side with nearly 200M supporters, for whom the only acceptable result was perfection. If things go wrong I'm sure we will see the other side of his even keel- we weren't as good as the media said we were, and we aren't as bad as they say we are.

Did anyone else enjoy his comment at the beginning of the interview that the bench players played better than the injured starting 11 have been? Sounds like he has an iron grip on the dressing room and won't defer to reputation.

Wow, just wow. That was a sensational performance, and we're playing the best football I can recall since the days of Gullit.

Funny how Belleti, Anelka and Malouda are prospering under a real manager (and it looks like Pizarro is doing the same in the Bundesliga.) We would have won the treble last season.

Love that Spurs have official B-movie status. Surely that's one for Blue Bayou to riff on.

Oh, and second to Poll as cunt of the week, here's M Sour-Chat himself, Arsene Wenger: 'For me, big results like that have no meaning. 5-0 Is not the difference between Middlesbrough and Chelsea. I watched the first 20 minutes. Every little deflection went for Chelsea and they didn’t ever need to get out of second gear to win the game.'

I'd have thought watching Spurs for a couple of weeks would be ample definition LINK

They could actually go down, couldn't they?

PeteW - Only one team has survived from a similar position before in the Premier League, Saints ten years ago.

I know we have a game midweek with the usual excellent report that will follow. I was just wondering as we have a reasonably big game this Sunday it would be nice if one of our intrepid bloggers (JD Tony Nick Mark BB) could write the usual insightful and humorous comments, to preview the event.

I feel it would get us all motivated, and help settle a few nerves, especially fiftees. :-)

They could actually go down, couldn't they?

@Pete
That would be the icing on the cake with us winning the quadruple, and Liverpool being repossessed by the banks after their loan being called in.

I might lob my four penneth in on the weekend's crunch clash at some point towards the end of the week. And Chelsea hero John Arne Riise should be back at the Bridge with Roma this week...

Spurs really are heading towards sh*t creek and are running short on players that look even vaguely competent enough to hold a paddle; Bolton, Arsenal and then Liverpool are their next 3 games in the league. If they get into November without at least a couple of points from those fixtures (not looking at all easy at present), it really will be panic stations up at the Lane.

Still think they'll pull it round, unfortunately, but they look like they're going to make very hard work of it.

Interesting to note that their final game of the season is up at Anfield. The permutations could be both too hideous / joyous to contemplate...

Thanks JD will look forward to it.

Proof that Rafa has got to second place in the league by luck more than judgement:

LINK

He wouldn't pay £14m for Aguero, who'll soon be confirmed as one of the best players in the world. And yet, he'd happily pay for Robbie Keane who's got 1 goal in 10 games!

Liverpool at home is one of the games i look forward to the most and yet slightly fear. We all know that if we play to our best, we'll wipe the floor with them. But Rafa always comes to park the bus, will put 10 men behind the ball and hope Torres (who will be fit) can do something special and nick a goal. That was his tactic in the semi-final of the CL last season, and will be his tactic again this Sunday.

Forgot to say good luck to Frank in the race for the Ballon D'Or. I know the top 3 of Messi, Kaka and Ronaldo will be virtually impossible to beat. But if he continues his recent remarkable form, who's to say that he can't spring a surprise? Is there anyone in Europe in better form than Frank right now?

Fantastic performence. Before the game my dad was going on about how Boro beat us 3-0 a couple of years ago. Funny how the boys went and wiped the floor with them. I dont know what has happened to Malouda, Big Phil has certainly got much more from him than AG ever did. Frank and co were noticably thrilled with their goals. On current form Kalou should be our second choice striker. Looking forward to the game vs Liverscum. Without Torres we should beat them badly but that wont be the case. As alot of you say he will play ultra defensive and hope a Gerrard free kick will somehow get through the wall and if that doesnt work then he will just leave it. Also nice to see my local team beat Spuds. Hopefully Relegation is just around the corner.Nobodoy should care about Arsene Whingers comments. Remember this was a fixture that his team lost last season.

Nobody

Another classic TBH cock-up in the City-Newcastle game.

Fellas,

We should relish the fact that we're not grabbing big bold headlines right now. It's much easier to win matches quietly and comprehensively without a giant target on your back!

Another defeat on the cards for city.

It looks like they won't be able to get the CL football required to attract the big name.

This will be their 4th defeat out of 5 since Robinho arrived!

Brilliant match! Mikel is really becoming better and better every match. Belletti has become an amazing utility player and Kalouuuuuuu is on fire! Go Blues!