re: In this thread: Mourinho complaining about West Ham's defensive tactics

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Shots (On Goal)

Chelsea 13 (4)

Arsenal 7 (2)

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explain yourselves arsenal people.

quote:

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explain yourselves arsenal people.

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Park the bus and counter. I don't think anyone will argue with Chelsea's ability to counter-attack. Not criticizing, just explaining.

Time of Possession
Arsenal 61%
Chelsea 39%

Thus the "not criticizing just explaining". It is legit for West Ham to approach the game that way as well even if they don't have as much quality to pull it off.

well, that stat on it's own doesn't really mean much.

we tend to overwork things and not take as many shots. our defensive style invites shots, particularly long range ones.

that match, there were a couple of luiz FKs from far out, a Torres shot from the half way line, and multiple shots coming off rebounds, etc.

we largely were in control of that match and, particularly in the first half, chelsea had some wild challenges which should have resulted in cards and, at least for Mikel, a sending off (Rosicky's challenge as a response to all that was pretty bad too but it was indicative at our frustration at lack of protection). more than any other coach's teams, jose's teams seem to take advantage of referee's unwillingness to card early.

jose's teams can generally bombard worse teams due to their overwhelming talent, but in big games they get very negative and focus on the counter. the only difference between what jose does and what sam did is that sam doesn't have eden hazard, CR7, et al to give the ball to when possession is won to strike quickly.

one last thing: it's hypocritical of jose to criticize that approach because of that last paragraph. no questioning that approach can be successful. the main qualm most have with jose is that he has had nearly unlimited resources and world class attacking talent over the years, and still plays like that.

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Park the bus and counter is cool if you're trying to counter. West Ham made no attempt to counter the whole game

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Yes, I believe this is the Chelsea point of view.

The other point of view is that parking the bus is a lot cooler when you don't have firepower like Hazard, Eto'o, Oscar, et al than when you do.

I think that is the point of the gif.

Mourinho whining about this is real rich.

Chelsea's going to turn right around and park the bus at City on Monday.

I think the result yesterday is going to force us to go for something against City. We are already essentially 4 points behind them as we will never make up that GD. We can't rely on anyone else in the prem to beat them so if we have any title aspirations we have to try and win Monday.

Any word on Aguero's status?

Also, I can't help but feel that he is trying to get the spotlight off his players going into the game... it has worked so far because all the talk is about this and not about the biggest game of the season to this date.