carefreeluke

I'm desperate to see a technical player in the centre of our midfield, Fabregas although very useful if managed correctly isn't someone you can rely on every week, every game, in every competition. Half a season man. Would love a technical player with mobility or at least someone who's comfortable on the ball, there's many from Spain we could get and probably for a decent price as well.

Yeah Marc is right. I do only do 14 hours which sounds like nothing but as a teacher it's a lot more than that, you take everything home with you. I'm busy with 14 which is less than the average. It depends on the person. Majority will teach in the afternoon / evening and hence do all their planning for those classes that day in the morning and maybe do a little bit at the weekends. I for example plan all my classes over the weekend, I don't like working under the pressure of doing everything in the mornings for the classes to come later that day. Don't get me wrong it's not a massive pressure, I can easily do it but I like to chill out a bit before I teach, I spend most of my mornings / early afternoons studying Spanish which I enjoy or doing other things to relax, then get all the planning done at the weekend. Doesn't mean I don't have a weekend, I still go out, play football, watch football etc and do anything else I want to do. Also have a three day weekend here. Planning can be difficult at the beginning and be even more time consuming but it's something you get better and quicker at as time goes by, you get more ideas and just through constant practice you get better at. Not forgetting that you can repeat other things and ideas, some classes will be the same level or they may work from the same book etc. Often you'll have the different groups but with the same level, so it can be just a case of repeating a lesson plan.

With the knowledge I have, I would say the majority of new teachers would start on that in France as the standard of living is more expensive there but there'd be a more informed person to ask about France. Spain in general it's lower, one of the academies I work at pays 12:50 I think an hour, I know some who pay as low as ten but the majority will just offer a monthly wage and not necessarily pay by the hour although it will depend on the place. If you're working in company for example you'd get a minimum of 20 euros an hour. With teaching English abroad mate a lot things are done on social media these days, specifically Facebook. If you haven't done so all ready I'd have a look on there, have a search for 'TEFL Teachers France' or 'English teachers in France' or things along those lines and join the groups and pages. You'll find lots of information there and job offers as well. Funnily enough a lot of teaching jobs going in Seville tend to be posted on Facebook these days, still seeing a lot pop up to this day and we're not even in peak hiring season. Anymore questions don't be afraid to drop me a PM, same @Danny

Depends what training you do mate, CELTA for example you'll do a lot of practice lessons and you can also do more extensive training courses. I did nothing like that, except for 10-15 minutes in front of my TEFL group where everyone had to teach something as practice. I started teaching in March 2017 which was a teaching internship in Seville which helped ease me into it nicely, got to see how everything works etc and I was only given one to one lessons or small classes of adults. One of the classes I taught in this internship for example was optional for the students, it came free with the classes they payed for and it was mainly conversation based. I was very nervous the first class I taught (as I hadn't done any teaching practice previously like on the CELTA for example) but like anything you get into the swing of things after a while. In most cases mate, unless you're learning at school, language classes are taught in the target language from the very beginning. If you want to learn Italian for example and you start having Italian classes, in most cases, the classes will all be in Italian from the very beginning. It's to get students accustomed to the language early on. This isn't always the case, for example it may depend on where the teacher is from and what languages they know but in the majority of cases language lessons are conducted in the language you're learning. You'll teach a variety of levels and everything works in the European framework of language, A1 to C2, with A1-A2 being beginners, B1-B2 more intermediate, C1-C2 a high level. In London over the summer for example, I sometimes taught an A1 class of around 15 Chinese students, they had a very low level of English but do I know Mandarin? No. It's not a problem. You just have to slow down you're speaking and a lot can be done with body language and through visual learning as well. You also have a lot of books designed for the different levels. Knowing Spanish for example in my case helps especially with the younger kids but it isn't essential, many come here with no knowledge of Spanish and many go around the world teaching with little or no knowledge of the language of the country in which they're teaching. And hours vary, 20-30 is about the average of a full time contract here in Spain but it depends on where and what type of teaching you're doing. You also need a lot of time to prepare lessons especially early on, lesson prep is the big downside of teaching but you get quicker and better at it as time goes by. Having a degree is also one of the requirements employers look for but I'm not sure how essential this is.

Classic.

@Danny Marc is right here about the CELTA being a lot better, it's really good training but very intense. It looks ten times better on your CV as well. The biggest question is whether you can afford to fork out over a grand though for the course. You are a lot more employable with a CELTA in Spain.

@Toinho I teach in Sevilla, kids and adults. I'm the sole teacher mate, a group of kids twice a week, the rest adults. I teach mainly in the afternoons/evenings from 16:00 to 21:30 but the schedule is different every day, sometimes I don't start until 18:00. It's Monday to Thursday but some academies are Monday to Friday, just depends. The academy where I work finishes later on average compared to others, most finish around 20:00 / 20:30. Money isn't great in teaching English but standard of living in Spain for example is a lot cheaper, typical type of contracts tend to be around 20 hours and earning between 1000-1400 per month here in Spain. Obviously it just depends on the place, some offer more hours, some less etc. You can go to some parts of the world and earn a lot more though. In Spain you can work in high schools but the majority of work is in academies, where students will come after school / work. Groups are small, on average no bigger than 8-10 students. An example, in my kids class there's 5 kids and the other academy where I work it's a maximum of four students per class but that's what that particular academy is marketed on, the classes being small and personalized. I've also picked up another class recently where I teach 15 adults most of them over 45 but this is not in an academy but through a different organisation. I did little training to be a teacher but have a lot of experience with language learning which I think has helped me a lot also. I did Spanish and French at uni for example but also attempted beginners stuff in Mandarin, Portuguese and Italian. So this experience has helped me more than I probably realised at the start, through the years of language classes I picked up a lot of things and ideas and also became familiar with grammar terms. Being an English teacher means learning your own language! I do take teaching seriously and really enjoy it to be honest and I've always loved the language learning environment. Never saw myself as teacher, it's nothing I would do at home but wanted to go back to Spain ever since I left in 2014 and teaching seemed the best option as there's tons of opportunities here for that.

I did a TEFL mate, a teaching qualification which in reality was a weekend course (two days in Paddington) and the other part was 30 hours of English grammar online which you can take as seriously as you want, you can whiz through it if need be. That's it and I'm teacher. Cost me 100 quid something. It's true though people often do more extensive training, over a month like the CELTA for example or there are longer TEFL courses as well. I know people in Spain though who have got English teaching jobs with nothing, no qualification or experience just they were a native speaker. Spain is really desperate for English teachers at the moment as everyone needs to learn English, there's been a big shift with that in Spain over the last 20 years. I reckon in 20-30 years there's going to be many Spaniards competent in English, similar to other countries in Europe where the English levels are high which is strange as this hasn't really been the case for Spain in the past. In France it's more difficult to find work as an English teacher but of course it can be done.

Opinions are what make football! Good reading this thread. I don't rate Willian highly (as you lot know on here) especially for a club wanting to be one of the best in Europe but recently is arguably the best we've seen from him in his Chelsea career. And Hazard is amazing.

About 5 good games in 30 for Willian, a spell of good games doesn’t make up for the rest where he’s been shite. First goal he’s ever scored in the knockout stages as well. I’m happy to see him improve though and currently it’s the best I can ever remember him being but it’s stuff like where he should have played in Kante in the second half that will always let him down. One thing for sure though, is that he’d look a lot better playing for someone like Liverpool or Man City, as would Pedro, as would Hazard. Willian’s a good squad player at best. Another example, I for one can count the amount of games on one hand where Alonso has played well and people will often point to the goals against Spurs, Southampton, Arsenal for example. But what about the other 50 games?

True this, my friend, true this. Something you learn to realise and appreciate more as you get older. One of my favourite things to do actually is to sit at home and relax and watch football with my family, any game that's on. One of the things I miss most about home is that and going to the games as well, my brother etc will be at the game tonight and it's one of those moments where you wish you could just teleport home or something. There's the football of course but more the general spending time with the family as well, going out for meals etc. Class. Anyway, not to sound like a cunt but the weather here in Seville is stunning at the moment, temperature drops massively in the mornings and at night but other than that it's beautiful.

Such a shame, lost a bit of respect for him actually, I would have taken this man at Chelsea. Talked about setting his family up for life, meh! This bloke would walk into a lot of top teams, going to miss watching him play.

I can think of many great performances Luiz has had for us in the big games, be it in defence or midfield and the extent of the criticism he's had over the years hasn't been fair. Conte won't play him there though and if it was us in charge I'd have preferred it if he had some more games under his belt going into the fixture. Same for Emerson, I'd pick Alonso for that reason. Interesting to see what Conte does, one of the rarer cases where it's difficult to predict his starting eleven and formation. Going into it with Drinkwater in midfield doesn't exactly fill me with hope, sorry lads. @Stan @Dan If he plays let's hope he proves me wrong, same with a good few of our players to be honest.

I was looking even further ahead as well but only had a quick look. Conte has confirmed Bakayoko is out of the Barcelona game which would mean Kante, Drinkwater and Cesc in midfield? Would have liked to have seen Conte use Luiz in that position a bit more who has proved over the years he has a big performance in him in the big games but lack of playing time may suggest he's not ready. Conte won't use him there anyway. The starting eleven is going to be interesting on Tuesday, think Giroud will start given the change last night.

Fucking tough run we have coming up, wouldn't be a surprise to see us miss out on the top four to be honest.

Classic.

Conte was fiery post-match after the Watford game, obviously slightly rattled by everything. He's also gone from saying last season that he doesn't sleep after dropping points, to this season where he said he has 'no problems sleeping', 'I sleep well'. I also think he's brought a lot of negativity onto himself with his comments throughout this season and I don't completely buy the story that the board have failed to back him. One of the softest red cards I've seen in a long time for Bakayoko against Watford but the reality was he was dreadful, like really bad in that first half. Would be interesting to see the difference if he joined the previous season where he'd have joined a team that was full of confidence, I wonder what difference that would have made. I'm still quietly confident about him though. Courtois has also been dreadful the last two games.

It happened a fair few times last season as well and it was something I was worried about even in the early days of when we changed the formation. Teams have done it in the past but I haven’t seen teams do it with the effectiveness and consistency City, Bournemouth and even Arsenal have done it. There’s been teams that have done it in short periods but eventually retreated and others who just sit back and in that case the majority of the time we win the game. It isn’t as simple as press high and you’ll beat us. The opposition have to play well, avoid stupid mistakes and have something about them. Newcastle in the league earlier in the season for example score first as a result of a period of high pressing (surprise, surprise) but go on to sit back and commit some very poor defensive mistakes and we go on to win the game. The problem is our system is machine like, it relies on certain movements and passing patterns. It use to have fluidity but now teams are clogging the system at source.

No thank you!

Finally watched the game back. Have to say full credit to Bournemouth, a long with Man City earlier this season, the best team I've seen tactically here in a long time. They used their extra rest well and took full of advantage of the energy, man on man high press, one forward for each of our centre backs, two men for Kante and Bakayoko. Pressing traps were constant, the images below are in and around the period where they score their second and third goals but they did it for the whole game until the last twenty minutes where they sat off and saw out the game and interestingly that is when we also had our best spell. We like the comfort of being able to transition into midfield, we like to be comfortable in that regard, Conte builds his teams from this basis and all Bournemouth did was kill us at source. Out of the back five I'd say only Christensen has the ability to play under pressure, Rudiger and Azpi are OK but short of the top players in that department. We were forced to kick long on many occasion and who to? Hazard? Pedro? Only a matter of time before we conceded. I was very impressed with Bournemouth when they came here to last season. As early as a few weeks after the famous formation change last season I always feared what would happen if team's high pressed us and conducted it in such a way like Bournemouth did on Wednesday, what would be our answer? Our we good enough to play out of it? No. Do we have other alternatives? At the moment no. Bournemouth's high pressing game.

Depends where I am, who I'm with etc. I spend a fair bit of time in English pubs here for the sole reason they're the only places really that show English football, so in that case it will be pints. Everywhere else it's cañas or bottled beers. Cañas wouldn't work in England but if there's one thing Spain has taught me over the years is that you really don't have to drink a bucket load when you go out. Drinking is at a much slower pace here (as is everything really) and often there will be a lot of food that accompanies the drinking. Don't get me wrong there's a time and place where I'd just want to go mental and drink everything but I've definitely learnt a small lesson here from Spanish culture. Yeah mate the first time I think I remember having Alhambra was last year in April and I was in Granada near the Alhambra palace funnily enough and we were sat up in the hills with a view of the whole city. It was hot, sun shining and it was just us and a couple of others in this bar which was pretty much hidden from all the tourists and we got free tapas (as of course in a lot of places in Granada it's free with any drink). So yeah good memories but trying not to judge the experience and more the beer itself, it's very decent, well above any average beer. Cruzcampo dominates Sevilla and I've seen Alhambra a lot less, may have to start looking out for it.

Do you drink pints or cañas mate?

Rudiger has done well yes but I feel he can improve at the same time, needs to work on his concentration. It doesn't help (as Liquidator points out) that he gets shifted about the back line but I think he was bought with that purpose in mind. We can be relatively happy with him though. I 'm sorry but I refuse to be sold on this man, article written about him today: https://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/premier-league/chelsea-marcos-alonso-2017-18-newcastle-fa-cup-a8182926.html The article makes the right point with regards to the system suiting him etc but this: Myth 1: He's quite good in and around the opponent's box but it's his purpose within the system to do that, it's following strict tactical instructions from Conte. I can't take anything away from his finishing but why doesn't Moses get these goal scoring opportunities on the other side? Because we don't get any crosses in from Alonso's side. There's little productivity there in terms of attacking play. Myth 2: He doesn't defend crosses well. Myth 3: He never gets in crosses! Everything is inside or backwards, he rarely whips the ball around a defender or creates the space for that to happen. He looks for the pass inside all the time, he's very limited in that regard, his body is facing inside to the midfield a lot of the game. As for Moses on the other side, he's becoming very predictable, can't remember the last time he actually beat a player, looks lacking in confidence in that regard. It was striking the other night when Iwobi had him in his pocket. I'm getting a bit tired of Moses running at a player only for it to result in him being dispossessed, would give Zappacosta more of a run in the team for the sheer reason that it's something different. And I've always liked Batshuayi to be honest, I rate him.