MFletcher

I was all for an experiment with Downing, but after Saturday, where he refused to jump for a high ball, refused to tackle and shat out of a bouncing ball which meant Pepe had to run the risk of getting his head kicked in to deal with it, he should have been told to pack his things and await transfer to whoever will take him in January. Going to WHL, and putting him up against Aaron f***ing Lennon? After Saturday? Just why?

My biggest concern personnel wise is how long Suarez is going to carry us into what effectively amounts to mid-table. Without him we'd probably be in the relegation zone, and I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say that.

As if Balotelli would come here at the minute.

That too. I consider his refusal to use Carroll on what appears to be the grounds of footballing ideology to be the single biggest mistake of the season. It floored us going into September when we didn't sign anyone to replace him. Granted he may have "expected" a replacement, but I'd rather we'd tried to make use of Carroll as opposed to sending him out to an Allardyce team and trying to buy 30 year old Clint Dempsey as a stop gap measure. Would it really have been that unpalatable to keep Carroll around and occasionally amend the team and tactics to accommodate him where circumstances necessitated? it's just weird, and results aren't really doing much to appease the growing sense of unease that he's been "overpromoted".

The plan was to sign Clint Dempsey. Whilst he would have been better than no-one, he's not exactly the difference between our current travails and challenging for the top four. Rodgers had money, he just spent it on different areas of the pitch. Last year we clearly needed a striker who would stick the ball in. We neglected that area in the summer (Borini appears to have been signed to play on the wing) and bought another midfielder for £15M. We then signed yet another midfielder on loan in Sahin. All the while we didn't bother signing anyone to stick the ball in the net on a regular basis.

There's nothing wrong with buying known entities if they're actually very good, but I'm a bit concerned that we've bought known entities who aren't actually contributing very much. We can sort of excuse Borini given he's coming from "a foreign country" and is being played out of position, but Allen is starting to look desperately overpriced and overhyped.

We've been missing it for ages and still chose to spend £15M of the budget on Joe Allen.

We're only three points ahead of Villa and three ahead of a Sunderland team who have a game in hand. f***ing. Hell.

He had, but I'm not buying the idea that we have a finisher but he's injured. A finisher he may be, but Rodgers was playing him as a winger. It's not exactly Downing at left back after watching him almost cost us he game on Saturday by refusing to challenge for the ball, but it's still weird. Why not stick the money for Borini and Assaidi together and buy a boss winger as opposed to a striker who you play out of position and a winger you don't play full stop?

We either change the system and play Gerrard in a position where he can do something or we drop him and play someone better suited to the patient, passing football he has us playing. Allowing the status quo to continue would be negligent in the extreme.

He was being played on the wing - he's not going to have much chance to show cutting edge out there. I can't really understand why you sign a finisher and then stick him on the wing.

You get the impression Rodgers thinks he's trying to reinvent the wheel here. And what has happened to Assaidi? He seems to have disappeared whilst we muck about with Stewart f***ing Downing at left back and playing a left back ahead of him.

I have a vision for the club, it doesn't mean I'm in any way capable of implementing it. I'm all for appointing someone with the ability to implement their vision, but I query whether Rodgers actually has that ability and I'm not really prepared to write off this season and next solely to "give him time". You earn time, you don't get it by default. Cobs makes a good point here. He spent £26M on two players. What concerns me there is that both look really quite overpriced and both played for him before. It's like something Martin O'Neill would do.

Agreed. We need to start getting results, because right now he looks out of his depth.

This isn't good enough. It just isn't. Some fight required to ensure we don't get completely swept aside here. Come on.

This whole thing is highly, highly embarrassing if you're a Chelsea fan. Grown men writing "RAFA OUT" into Microsoft Word, colour coding it, printing it off and then standing holding them up during the game. It's genuinely laughable.

It is, but then Kenny didn't Suarez for a quarter of the league season. The wheels came off after the new year, but if we finish 8th again it would be an incredibly mediocre season. At least last year the cup runs provided a more than welcome distraction from the struggles in the league.

Who's Hodgson? The bloke managing England? He did alright at West Brom having taken over there immediately after leaving Fulham.

This is it. If 8th wasn't good enough last season and two cup finals wasn't enough to save him, it shouldn't realistically be good enough this season either. Think a reassessment is required in February. If we're in danger of finishing in the bottom half then things will get messy.

It's clear FSG didn't really have the first idea what they were doing in the summer.

Chelsea fans are a shambles. A proper shambles.

Gerrard appears to be incompatible with the philosophy given he's always looking for the longer/killer ball. He either needs to show flexibility in the setup and give Gerrard this freedom or drop Gerrard and play someone who'll stick to the short, patient game he wants. Allowing the status quo to plod on ineffectively without making the call on one or the other will do us no favours in the short term.

It is essential to caveat everything critical with "that's just my opinion" and "I don't actually want us to lose to look right" to pre-empt some of the childish arguments people will use.

This is it. Over the course of the season, we have a 23% win ratio in the league and our participation in two other competitions is either over or in serious danger of being over. The other top four teams "competitors" being a bit s*** this year isn't really an excuse. There was a big opportunity to push into the gap left by the likes of Arsenal struggling, but instead we're actually doing worse and clinging on with "only X number of points behind".

I'm not trying to spin anything. Ultimately the only thing being "spun" is the acceptance of a diabolical win ratio of 23% with "well, we've been the better team in most of those games".