The international break is a heartless bitch.

Goetz - out 10-12 weeks

Schweinsteiger - Fuck.

Aguero - out with a hamstring injury (he needs to talk about this with Giggs).

Matic - limped off during the game

Ivanovic - Off with an injury

I'm sure more will pop up.....

Yeah, it sucks a lot.

Some good games though. Ireland upsetting Ze Germans, always good for a laugh when the Germans blame the ref, the post, the 'luck 'o da Irish'!!

Bein Sport worth it now with the Brazil/Chile game. Wonderful display by Alexi Sanchez. Ecuador being the masters of Argentina in Monte Video too. Quite amazing. Valencia had a blinder and Argentina have a few very off form players with Di Maria being exhibit number one.

I think Silva has been injured in Spain's game.

Ivanovic - Off with an injury

TickTok wrote:

Ivanovic - Off with an injury  

Mourinho will still likely start him.

Redcanuck wrote:

TickTok wrote:

Ivanovic - Off with an injury  

Mourinho will still likely start him.

Alas. you are not wrong mate. I really dont get that decision, but as I have said before, its the only thing the manager is doing wrong in my eyes

Tough break for Man City. Feel terrible for them.

Ivanovic. Wow Chelsea fans have really abandoned this guy! He's been one of the most loyal and consistently good performers for the club for 7 years, was the only Chelsea player to be named to the Uefa CL team of the year last year, he has a couple of duffers and you can't wait to send him out to pasture?

You wear the Chelsea shirt and unless you are a white racist douche bag, you will definitely be walking alone.

Milt wrote:

Tough break for Man City. Feel terrible for them.

Ivanovic. Wow Chelsea fans have really abandoned this guy! He's been one of the most loyal and consistently good performers for the club for 7 years, was the only Chelsea player to be named to the Uefa CL team of the year last year, he has a couple of duffers and you can't wait to send him out to pasture?

You wear the Chelsea shirt and unless you are a white racist douche bag, you will definitely be walking alone.  

Ivanovic seems to have lost his legs. Once they start to go, they can go pretty quickly.

Morata is also out for Juve. This will impact their CL progress.

Redcanuck wrote:

Milt wrote:

Tough break for Man City. Feel terrible for them.

Ivanovic. Wow Chelsea fans have really abandoned this guy! He's been one of the most loyal and consistently good performers for the club for 7 years, was the only Chelsea player to be named to the Uefa CL team of the year last year, he has a couple of duffers and you can't wait to send him out to pasture?

You wear the Chelsea shirt and unless you are a white racist douche bag, you will definitely be walking alone.  

Ivanovic seems to have lost his legs.  Once they start to go, they can go pretty quickly.

Milt has a point though. To single him out as "the only thing the manager is doing wrong" is, to put it nicely, silly.

Terry looks old, Pedro looked terrible against Everton, and the mid field pairing of Matic and Ramires hasn't been good enough.

TT. what do you think of Begovic?

Redcanuck wrote:

Milt wrote:

Tough break for Man City. Feel terrible for them.

Ivanovic. Wow Chelsea fans have really abandoned this guy! He's been one of the most loyal and consistently good performers for the club for 7 years, was the only Chelsea player to be named to the Uefa CL team of the year last year, he has a couple of duffers and you can't wait to send him out to pasture?

You wear the Chelsea shirt and unless you are a white racist douche bag, you will definitely be walking alone.  

Ivanovic seems to have lost his legs.  Once they start to go, they can go pretty quickly.

Don't disagree, but I don't remember United fans throwing Giggs, or Ferdinand or Vidic under the bus quite so quickly, and calling them the "managers only mistake".
If he was a horse TT would be using him as dog food and glue already. That's your plastic for you.

There were compliants about Rio near the end if I recall correctly. Giggs didn't start much the last few years and Vidic probaly could have stayed another year as well as Evra.

Here's the full list of casualties after that set of games.

Pogba
Schweinsteiger
Benzema
Götze
Agüero
Silva
Morata
Ivanović
Matić
Coentrão
David Luiz

Some of those are genuine problems some are guys trying to avoid playing the second game of the double header.
These guys take advantage of a little niggle to put in a sick note.

Aguero and Silva have had questionable fitness for a couple of seasons, as has Schweinsteger.

Sounds like Bastian may not be that bad. Plus too, you can't trust the doctors of these international teams. The window of recovery always seems to change once the player is back with his club. I'd wager Aguero makes the derby.

Tim Krul is done for six months +

Koralov picked up a knock playing for Serbia. With Kompany to disobey City's orders not to play for Belguim, a injry there and it couldn't be any worse of break for City.

Van Persie and Depay had a fight. Van Persie was then benched (maybe he would have been anyway) Typical dutch in fighting.

Milt wrote:

Van Persie and Depay had a fight. Van Persie was then benched (maybe he would have been anyway) Typical dutch in fighting.

Well, with their performance in qualifying, I'm not surprised of any fighting.

You would have thought they would have saved their fight for the game.

Lot of things need to go right for the Dutch to even make the play offs. They need to beat the Czechs and hope Iceland go to Turkey and win. Don't think it will happen for the Dutch.

Dutch down two at the half and looking to say bye-bye to Euro 2016. Hard to imagine they were 3rd at the WC.

See? Not only England that sucks

This nicely highlights the variability of International football.  It also highlights how shite it is for the most part, too.

Meanwhile, England have looked like Brazil in the late 50's early 60's for most of qualifying.  Rock solid back to front.  Conceded three goals in ten games.  Granted, they had a group easier to score on than Chelsea, but still...

At least England usually get the qualifiers right, raise our hopes than suck at the actual tournament.

Every time I've watched England , I've thought they look absolutely amateur, and then they win 3-0. It's bizarre.

One thing for sure. They look ten times better without Rooney than with, which when you think of his scoring record is crazy.

I predict three and out...or at best scraping through second place in their group and getting knocked out by Portugal in the first knock out game, probably on penalties. After which Hodgson will come out as a woman and ask to be known as Rhonda Hodgson.

Milt wrote:

Every time I've watched England , I've thought they look absolutely amateur, and then they win 3-0. It's bizarre.

One thing for sure. They look ten times better without Rooney than with, which when you think of his scoring record is crazy.

I predict three and out...or at best scraping through second place in their group and getting knocked out by Portugal in the first knock out game, probably on penalties. After which Hodgson  will come out as a woman and ask to be known as Rhonda Hodgson.

Is this what we're gonna do now Milt? Gonna go on a Rooney basher? The second post on this. Imagine...an ageing player not performing like he did when he was six years younger.