Chelsea fans have to be disappointed with dropping points to QPR, but this game should serve as a reminder as to why Chelsea need to run out a strong squad against every single Premier League opponent. Manchester City did Chelsea a favor, dropping points today as well. We still haven't lost in the Premier League, and we'll be welcoming Italian champion's Juventus to town on Wednesday as we kick off our defense of the Champions League title. Here's my initial thoughts from Saturday's fixture:
- Unfortunately there's just no way to ignore this, so we'll start with the handshakes. I really don't care what Anton Ferdinand and John Terry think of each other, but what exactly is Ferdinand trying to prove when he ignores Ashley Cole? Cole was not part of the incident, and said nothing negative about Ferdinand in that entire affair. I don't think anyone holds his contempt of Terry against him, but blaming Cole for last year's incident just seems both stupid and childish.
Andre Mariner was absolutely terrible today. Chelsea had two certain penalties in the first half and two more legitimate shouts (although the Ferdinand 'handball' on Mikel's shot would have been very harsh). The again, we had a bit of a gift from the ref against Reading, so this may be balancing things out. Mariner also generally allowed the play to get far too physical, which in turn probably led to several of the dangerous tackles which we saw during the contest.
Julio Cesar's save against Eden Hazard was very good. Hazard had him going the wrong way and Cesar still managed to push the ball safely away.
The David Luiz attempt to head that first half corner home was terrible, but his movement leading up to the awful attempt was outstanding.
I absolutely hate watching games at both Loftus Road and Craven Cottage. The camera angles at both are just terrible, and they constantly lose the ball on the near side of the field. It's only made worse when Tony Gale's comments are added into the mix.
This Eden Hazard character is pretty good. His vision is absolutely fantastic.
Loftus Road erupted with applause when John Terry pulled up injured. Classy.
Anyway, here's the community ratings form for you all to have fun with. Have at it...