Are Chelsea Worthy Champions?
I’ve always been a big believer in ‘you get what you deserve’ and I remember saying the same thing a couple of seasons ago. We’d somehow managed to take United all the way in the title race in spite of having Avram Grant managing us but I couldn’t get any enthusiasm together about it. It felt as if our position had more to do with luck than judgement and being brutally honest at the time, I had to admit United were worth the title. And yet when the situation is reversed, we apparently don’t deserve it.
It seems when it comes to us winning the title this season, what we’re hearing from some quarters is that we won it because key decisions went in our favour or we benefited from rivals weakened by injuries. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not suggesting injuries to key players don’t have an effect on a side, clearly they do. We had a pretty injury-ravaged season ourselves in 2006/07 and started the 07/08 season completely depleted as well and yet I distinctly remember that not being an acceptable ‘excuse’ for failing to win either of those titles.
The fact is, we’re supposed to have squads with sufficient depth to compete irrespective of how many of our ‘first choice’ we have available for any given game and this season with an ‘ageing’ side Ancelotti wasn’t given the resources to deepen, we’ve also had a few notable injuries that have made life difficult at times (Essien, Bosingwa and Carvalho missing most of the season for instance), but we’ve managed to get on with it anyway. And like us in 2007-08, whilst United’s injuries have been pretty extreme, they still managed to get within a point of us, which suggests the squad they have isn’t all that shallow.
As for referees handing us the advantage, I don’t doubt we had some decisions go in our favour but I also don’t doubt there have been others we haven’t got – in other words, decisions that have gone in our rivals’ favour whether this year, last year etc, so that’s a bit of a non-argument anyway. The truth is, we didn’t just win this title deservedly, we won it in style.
We’ve still had the odd bad day at the office, dropping points we shouldn’t have and making an early exit from the Champions League, but it was the response to those that defined our season. Somehow, the players were able to pick themselves up from those disappointments and come back stronger.
That strength has seen us beat our rivals home and away, score a phenomenal 103 goals with 41 coming in 9 home games, rack up more than 7 goals in 4 of our games – and we still have an FA Cup final to come. So if all that really points to a side that doesn’t deserve what they’ve got out of this season, then football really must be a funny old game.
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I really wouldn’t worry about it – the majority of intelligent observers know Chelsea won because they were the best team.
And that’s coming from an Arsenal fan.
Lets face it ,when was the last time we got the deserved plaudits from the press. How about the JT saga when every newspaper wanted to remove JT from the captaincy and install rooney, as much respect as i have for rooney, an off the field incident should not have been used to kick him outta captaincy. There s always the pleasure that the media derives from the chelsea bashing. It was JT first then it was Ashley cole. Give em hell. We won the title and they still can’t decide whether we deserved it? Shame on them. We have fared better than the other sides in the prem league and on top of that Frankie gets overlooked in the PFA team of the year!! It’s really hopeless!!!
The decision that gets mentioned the most and mostly by Man U fans to be sure is the Drogba offside. Conveniantly forgetting the Macheda handball, so it would have been 1-0 to us. The blinders are really on for that game. To be fair it mostly comes from London Man U supporters. Actual Mancs, blame the Glazers, as they should. Man U did much better than I thought they would with the squad they have.
Man U supporters talking about biased ref’s would be fucking funny, if it wasn’t so sad. As for the media, they are mostly just trying to sell papers I think. Everyone had a bad season and we just happened to be the least bad, as well as playing some great attacking football and we haven’t spent much money in the last few seasons either. Deserving? Yes.
for the past few seasons the big four have lost games to smaller clubs so in this season it happened again thats no surprise. MU can scream all they want. Its denial to the failure of replacing ronaldo adequately.
i juz want to talk abt the last wigan game. the pressure was immense. Only a win could produce a title, Martinez was boasting of smashing our title dreams blah blah blah, totally ignoring the fact that we lost at wigan not because they played exceptionally well at home. Losing to Tot 9 – 1 n drew 2-2 with hull at home are no where near a top team.
The 8-0 mauling was a payback rather than a well-matched game. I saw justice when they had caldwell sent off. I wish the had pollitt sent off then the score would be an unbreakable record as we would hv scored 15 goals.
Playing 3 defenders against us? Thats public suicide. After the sent off Martinez went haywire sending on moses n shrapner hoping to salvage some pride. At that point i was sure Martinez had finally realised that playing with 10 men away was a monumental task trying to come from behind. Revenge is best served cold. He felt cold alright. He felt what we felt when cech was red-carded.
8-0 was a kind result to Wigan. had their keeper been off Martinez would never see daylight again when they next see our team in his schedule.
i vote wigan as one of the teams to be relegated next season. they dont deserve to be in epl.
maybe at the start of the game Martinez was hoping for another red card for cech. hee hee. so when caldwell was off (oooooouuuuch!) he went even crazier in his tactics. well whatever that was we r hard to beat at home with 11 players intact.
This idea of worthy champions is an absolute joke
I would rather be a unworthy champion then a worthy non-champion
Our rivals ALWAYS say the league is down whenever someone ELSE wins yet tough when they win
Sound bad doesn’t it?
In the course of a season, every champion benefits from luck and bad referrees (see: Barcalona – Champions League). When people mention the Drogba goal against ManU, they fail to mention the clear penalty Anelka had drawn. They also fail to mention ManU’s loss to now-relegated Burnley early on. When push comes to shove, unless you win every game in the season, you don’t have a legit complaint if you are not champions.
Also, remember Chelsea needed 3 wins in the last 3 matches. Chelsea won all three matches by a combined total of 17-nil.
Chelsea record against the Big Four – 6 wins, no losses, 1 goal conceded.
A record 103 goals scored. A club record 8-0 win to cap the league season.
All this easily makes a championship.
We are completely worthy champions. Over 38 games we got the most points, beat all our rivals and scored the most goals.
The only reason there’s an element of doubt is because in our 2 games against Man Utd, we scored 2 dubious goals. Obviously there’s a lot of Man Utd fans out there (mainly in surrey) who are up in arms because “those goals cost us the league”, well quite frankly they’re talking rubbish. What they should be looking at is the defeats to Burnley, Fulham (they got absolutely smashed! by the way) and Aston villa.
Man Utd are a great team but a lot of their fans seem to think they own the Premier League trophy and should win it every year just by turning up. Well this year they weren’t good enough. end of.
carefree.
u r right trious MU people r forever lousy losers!
Of course Chelsea are worthy champions, the fact they beat United, Arsenal and Liverpool home and away, scored 7 three times and an 8 shows they were a class apart, plus they had a few long term injuries and the Africa Cup of nations, they had a few games where they were unlucky and a few nervous moments, but they should have had the title wrapped up weeks ago.
Had the referee and linesman rightly disallowed Terry’s goal against us at Stamford Bridge, Manchester United would be Champions. No denying it. Had United had a match defining decision against you that evened the score, then I would understand where you are coming from. But that didn’t happen.
If Chelsea had been playing with Lampard and Ballack in the centre of your defence (like we had been playing Fletch and Carrick) United would have steamed ahead of you.
Although I’m glad you rate yourselves so highly. I guess it will hurt all the more when you finish 3rd next season.
Worthy winners my arse, you bunch of cunts
United just had their worst season for years with the worst injuries we’ve ever suffered during the Premiership years, the linesman/ref gifted you points against us… and you still only finished 1 point ahead? You think that is an achievement?
Scott, mate, just quit whining, you sound like your manager!
Shut up about your so-called injuries as every team suffers from them and just hope nothing serious happens to Rooney because then you will be in trouble.
Man Utd – more like One Man Team United!
jeez, this is exactly what i mean about man utd fans. They never blame their own team, it’s always someone else’s fault.
Face facts man U fans, you were not good enough this year. Your squad wasn’t strong enough to cope with the injuries you sustained and you became too reliant on Rooney.
I’m by no means suggesting Chelsea are some all conquering perfect-side, we have some serious flaws in our team that need addressing during the close season if we want to continue winning trophies.
But this season over 38 games i think Chelsea deserved to win the league.
Also, find it rather sad that chelsea fans having a sensible discussion about the season have to put up with man utd fans calling us all cunts. Pretty much proves my point about them i think.
Blaming injuries and refs Scott?I expected nothing better of you.
We skinned you 3 times this year yet you still lie to yourself,silly cunt.
Scott – Yes, there was controversy in how some matches were won. But is that not part of football?
If ManU had won the EPL, could I complain about how Own Goal scored a bucket load for ManU this campaign, and hence ManU didn’t deserve the trophy because they were “helped” by other clubs, wittingly or not, along the way?
Every team gets some short ends and some slack somewhere down the line. Either all of these stuff gets labeled “part and parcel of football”, or hypocrisy is running rampant.
hollow hollow hollow Chelsea success is fucking hollow!!
no Class no history
Michael – You cannot compare own goals with wrong decisions which win you football games. Own goals are within the rules of the game… offside, fouls etc. are not.
The own goals scored in United’s favour were through deflections (something no Chelsea fan has any room to talk about thanks to the expert, Lampard) and dangerous balls in to the box which defenders were trying to get in the way of, to stop the United player behind them having a simple tap in.
Bad decisions get made week in week out and will continue to get made until video refereeing. It’s ridiculous that the FA are living in the Stone Age, but whatever. Take your game against Bolton when John Terry was playing netball in the box and no penalties were given. It happens. The point is, Chelsea won the league by 1 point and had JT’s goal not been given against us Stamford Bridge, we would have won the league. When the top two teams play each other, they are six pointers, so the decisions against Bolton or whoever else don’t massively bother me, it’s the wrong decisions that get made when we play each other that count… and that is why Chelsea won the league.
Celebrate it, believe you’re worthy winners, but the fact remains you won the league because of dodgy decisions. Deny it all you like but you know it’s the truth as much as I do.
Mattsmash – Our squad wasn’t strong enough? If four of your centre backs were injured, who would you play in defence?
Kostaz – In the Charity Shield you beat us on pens after that dirty German cunt got away with murder to help you score. At Stamford Bridge you beat us because the referee awarded you a freekick for Fletcher winning the ball cleanly, and allowed the goal to stand despite Wes being fouled in the box and Drogba being offside and interfering with play. At Old Trafford you beat us because the linesman couldn’t see Drogba was two yards off side. Silly little rent boy.
Scott – I think simply by the fact that you’re defending how Own Goals is a part of the ManU squad in how all the deflections are actually assists (you didn’t say that, not explicitly no. But your justification about how the own goals were scored, etc. points to that exact point) pretty much concludes that you will insist to the point of death that Chelsea doesn’t deserve the title because the referees in effect stole it from you.
Think about it from another perspective – if ManU deserved the title, why weren’t Own Goals goals actually scored by ManU players? Why wasn’t the actual finish applied? Why did ManU struggle through so many games throughout the season by eking out 1-0 victories one after another, at many a time last gasp victories? Were ManU the better team, even though it took the aid, again – wittingly or not – of the other team to win?
The bottom line is we can argue with each other till the cows come home as to who was the better team this season. You call it referees stealing the title away from you and gifting it to us – I see referees making questionable or even outright wrong decisions against Chelsea in other matches as well, and hence it’s part of the game. I see ManU getting away with wins for games that they played poorly and never deserved to win – you call it simply a part of the game and attribute it to ManU putting strong offensive pressure to tilt the balance (even though it was clear to all ManU’s finishing just wasn’t there in those games).
The difference? I don’t go to your blog to make sour grapes remarks during those matches, and I accept that Own Goals is a part of the game. You on the other hand ignore the times questionable decisions benefit ManU, and argue for the “betterment of football” in general when it’s convenient.
Enough said.
And in case my position on whether Chelsea deserved the title or not didn’t come through – of course I think Chelsea deserved the title. I give kudos to ManU for pushing the envelope till the final day of the EPL – something that hasn’t happened in some time – but I felt that Chelsea performed better and resoundingly when called on to do so, bounced back from sudden dips of form better, and had a number of vicissitudes of footballing life go its way. Overall, the end result of 103 goals scored, the strongest home form in the league and Golden Boot speaks for themselves.
ManU was always pushing the envelope throughout the season, but suffered from a few key things – the mismanagement of Tevez (love him or hate him – the latter for me – but one cannot deny the sheer number of goals he scored in ManCity), the failure for another striker (or player, for that matter) to step up to assist Rooney in the job of scoring, and a lack in offensive follow through in those games which simply made me think that ManU was not performing confidently. The vicissitudes of footballing life was something I extended sympathy to for my ManU supporting friends when they happened, and I felt that the team deserved much kudos for pulling through even after sending MCs to the DC position. But the bottom line is that there was just a sense of a lack of finality in the ManU games – a flurry of punches, but no KO.
I repeat – own goals are a lawful part of the game. Being given a goal for offside, or being given a freekick for non-existant foul, are no lawful parts of the game.
Would you say that an own goal is the same as Henry’s goal against Ireland? No. One goal is a lawful part of the game, the other is poor officiating. If the ref had seen it, it would have been ruled out, because it was against the rules of the game. Referees don’t rule out own goals because they are a part of the game.
The difference is painfully obvious. If you don’t get it, you don’t get it. But we both know you won the league because of dodgy decisions, whether you will admit it openly or not.
sk22 – Can you come back and please give us the defintion of history? Notts County are the oldest club in the country but have won very little in that time. I take you’d define them as having no history then?
Why you’re at it why don’t you enlighten us what ‘classy’ club you support as well if you’re so superior. Although I’m pretty sure we can all guess. Muppet.
And as for Scott The Red blabbering on about refereeing decisions, what about those 2 extra points you were gifted against Man City at Old Trafford when the ref played on until Utd scored the winner well after injury time was up? I bet you didn’t mind that? So we’ll take those 2 extra points off you for that poor officiating and take 2 from us from the ‘injustice’ of Chelsea’s victory over Man Utd at the Bridge and guess what? We still win the title.
Poor old Scott the red, never accepting his team were just not good enough, not accepting that we beat the big 4 home and away and scored more goals than ever before, labouring under the illusion that manure have some god given right to win everything every year and most importantly not coming to terms with the fact that he supports a one man team.It truly is pathetic, I followed a link to one of their sites the other day, rebublik of mancunia I believe its called. the levels of denial on it were truly staggering as were the levels of intellectual discourse, Fxxk them cxxts was about the height of it.
I had to laugh.