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An out of the closet Teso?

She could, if she stoped making what she seemingly considers music.

Excuse me Sir, it appears to me you misspelled 'gaylo'.

But every top side pushes the full backs on, except perhaps for United. Liverpool can't sit back and shield their defense, so it's clear the solution lies elsewhere. Van Dijk is far faster and more agile in one on ones, and is comfortable winning the ball back and then distributing under pressure. Those are both areas where Lovren struggles. It seems to me that Lovren likes static battles like he had with Lukaku. Besides better defenders, top sides can afford to push the full backs up because they know they're not going to give the ball away, except around the opposition box. Liverpool are so bad at progressing the ball safely up the pitch, and every time Henderson, Milner or Can screw up, the defense will be caught out.

I certainly don't feel bad for a fella who gets paid 100k a week to play football really badly.

I just don't like her at all and what she is doing. So I don't care about her looks as well.

Apart from the shitty halo.

That is absolutely beautiful.

@Mel81x Our poor form really has been a mixture of things. Started in the summer with preparation, our squad doesn't have enough depth, quality and specific types of players in each position. I don't think Conte would have wanted to use Fabregas and Bakayoko as much as he has done so far, he's been forced to use Cesc more than he would have liked because of injury problems etc and Bakayoko I believe has played more than the club would have liked given his injury concerns. Hindsight is a wonderful thing here but could we have had one or two players in the squad that would have helped us in this regard? Or have we been unlucky? Kante, Baka, Cesc, Drinkwater and the possibility to play Luiz in midfield some would say that's decent enough cover but we've switched to a three man midfield at times this season which only leaves us one midfielder spare if Luiz is playing at centre back and then you take into account Baka's fitness concerns and the type of player Fabregas is? Was this a miscalculation on the club's part? It can also be put down to the manager with his team selection where at times he's refused to move Luiz into midfield to help us in that area. Lastly, I feel we've failed to add real quality, the only position I've think we've upgraded has been Bakayoko for Matic. Morata for Costa as I said at the time wasn't an upgrade for me but let's hope he proves me wrong in this regard come the end of the season. Our business and squad management here is part of the problem. We changed our system at the start of October last season and it took other teams until around April this year to eventually start being effective tactically against it, the first team to have real success were Tottenham in late November (a game which we still won) but they then went on to beat us in January of that season. It wasn't until April really until you a saw a couple teams start to combat the system significantly enough but by that time we were full of confidence and we worked hard to churn out results as many teams do towards the end when they win a title, confidence, adrenaline, the closeness to winning something helped spur us on towards the end, like it does for many teams. From April this year I remember Southampton, Man United, Man City, Watford (on two separate occasions) Arsenal, Roma all tactically being superior for large periods or full games. I also remember Bournemouth doing very well against us tactically on Boxing Day last year. Our system relies on certain movements, certain passing combinations and has specific tactical traits and aspects all of which have been drilled and drilled by Conte since the system was introduced. I've been seeing more and more people this season say we park the bus but this is not the case, first of all we’re set up to play good and progressive football, some of the best football I’ve seen us play watching Chelsea was last season under Conte, I remember Pep saying last year that we played the best football in the league (or something like that) and John Motson alluded to us saying we delivered ‘the greatest ever Premier League’ performance he’d seen. Don’t get me wrong we’re not as attacking as say City, Liverpool, Spurs etc but we’re progressive and like to play, the difference being and (what made us good last season) was the fact that we had the option to play on the counter attack as well and we were very effective at it. First, we’d attempt to get on the ball and take the initiative (that’s the case with any team we play) if that doesn’t work for whatever reason, the opposition are superior in possession or we’re not playing well for example we remote to counter attacking mode. We have a clear identity and playing style and I don’t know how it took teams so long to work it out, perhaps it says something about the tactical strength of this league which is something foreign players always comment on and say the Premier League is a lot weaker in that department compared to others in Europe. Quite comical looking back and seeing the number of teams that attempted to change to three at the back, (some had success with it mind) but it perhaps said a lot more about their own situation and identity. The league has improved though in this regard with the amount of high quality managers coming in. Anyway, more to the problem we’re having this season, it’s in part down to the increasing strength of teams around us, Spurs and City for example are both very well coached, Man United have improved and even Wenger has had some decent moments against us. I think Liverpool play one way and one way only and they’re very good on their day but Klopp hasn’t looked to exploit us tactically as much as the other top teams. The quality of the top teams shouldn’t be used as an excuse on our part but you have to admit it’s a part of reality at this moment in time. However, the bigger problem we’re facing is the fact that teams are having more success tactically against us, they pin back our wing backs and they press high. Last season we could play out from the back and transition in possession with ease, less and less teams are letting us do that this season, we'd outnumber teams before, now we’re struggling to transition into midfield and work our way up the pitch. We’re forced to go long a lot more now and against better teams especially, this means the ball keeps coming back and back. Poch, Pep and Wenger are fully aware of this and take advantage of it, then you’ve had smaller teams like Bournemouth and Watford attempt to do the same, perform very well and they should be applauded for it but ultimately what costs them is a lack of quality compared to the bigger teams, they’ll make more mistakes in possession which we punish or they fail to take their chances. I commented very early on after the system change last season (it’s shame we’ve lost all the old posts) that it was going to be a concern when teams starting pressing high against us and you can now start to see the problem it’s bringing. Of course, it’s not as simplistic as teams are now pressing high, you also have the fact that intensity wise we haven’t been the same as last season, as mentioned squad management has played a part as well. The smaller teams either sit off against us which helps us but they then have to take into account if they trust themselves to press high and take on possession (which we could punish on the counter) hence they have to manage the situation and choose wisely. I’m not asking we change our system or anything and as more and more top clubs are finding these days it’s becoming increasingly difficult after having a good and successful season to then go on and improve once again in the second but the manager and club need to find ways to improve and to provide fresh impetus. Whether that be with personnel (an area in which I don’t think we’ve improved enough in) or through over means.