Hey, at least this guy isn't going to torment us today.

Team news and the like from 2:30pm EST.

Team sheets
Everton
Howard; Neville, Heitinga, Distin, Baines; Donovan, Gibson, Fellaini, Pienaar; Cahill; Stracqualursi.

The two teams have been confirmed for today.Bosingwa starts at left-back, Cahill makes his debut and Essien returns for first start of the season.
Chelsea:
Cech, Ivanovic, Cahill, Luiz, Bosingwa, Essien, Meireles, Malouda, Sturridge, Torres and Mata.
Subs: Turnbull, Ferreira, Bertrand, Hutchinson, Romeu, Piazon, Lukaku.

JOSH. Fortunately, he won't be playing against us. Nevertheless, this is going to be hella difficult.

Team news and the like from 2:30pm EST.

Team sheets
Swansea City
Vorm, Rangel, Caulker, Williams, Taylor, Britton, Allen, Sigurdsson, Dyer, Sinclair, Graham.

It's a simple question but with a difficult answer. With a chance to close the gap on City, United and Spurs, Chelsea travel to Carrow Road in Saturday's lunchtime kick off.
With three players added to the fold and in contention to start the question is who do you think should start this game for Chelsea?

So yesterday was a day without Wikipedia.
How did we all cope?
Maybe by using the various workarounds that let you bypass Wiki's self-imposed protest blackout. Or whiling away the hours following STV's #fitbawiki chat on Twitter.
Or you could have gone old school and picked up a book.

Chelsea's confirmed line up to take on Valencia tonight is as follows:
Chelsea Team: Cech, Ivanovic, Cole, David Luiz, Romeu, Ramires, Mata, Drogba, Meireles, Sturridge, Terry.
Chelsea subs: Turnbull, Lampard, Torres, Mikel, Malouda, Ferreira, Kalou
Your thoughts?
KTBFFH
Check out my blog posts on the Official Chelsea Website - http://bit.

Newcastle vs Chelsea 0-3 Highlights 2011 Goals Video Drogba Kalou Sturridge Lampard penalty miss is a post from Soccer Blogger. Follow Soccer Blogger on Twitter

Newcastle vs Chelsea 0-3 Highlights 2011 Goals Video Drogba Kalou Sturridge Lampard penalty miss is a post from Soccer Blogger. Follow Soccer Blogger on Twitter Newcastle vs Chelsea 2011 ( Newcastle Chelsea video below) Score and result:- Newcastle vs Chelsea 0-3 ( Drogba, Kalou, Sturridge ) St.

An emotional Craig Bellamy during the minutes applause for Gary Speed...Liverpool have booked themselves a place in the Carling Cup Semi Finals after beating Chelsea for the second time in ten days at Stamford Bridge. The 2-0 win saw Martin Kelly and Maxi Rodriguez bag the Reds their goals whilst Chelsea couldn't even muster a consolation.

Liverpool Through To Semi Finals

An emotional Craig Bellamy during the minutes applause for Gary Speed... Liverpool have booked themselves a place in the Carling Cup Semi Finals after beating Chelsea for the second time in ten days at Stamford Bridge. The 2-0 win saw Martin Kelly and Maxi Rodriguez bag the Reds their goals whilst Chelsea couldn't even muster a consolation.

I reckon a run of the mill, ho-hum recap of this defeat our sixth of the term would represent the most extraneous of missions. What I really fancy at the moment is a mindless ramble on any number of things that caught my eye during this eyesore of a match.

One of those days

On with the musings:

• No need to hold any punches here.

Liverpool defender Martin Kelly has joked on Twitter that he and midfielder Jay Spearing had a bet over who would score their first senior goal for the club.
The tweet came after Kelly scored the Reds' second goal in their 2-0 win over Chelsea at Stamford Bridge in the League Cup quarter-final on Tuesday evening.

Chelsea 0-2 Liverpool: Bellamy stars to give Chelsea the Blues again

Liverpool triumphed at Stamford Bridge for the second time in nine days, to move a step closer to a trip to Wembley. With less than two days rest since Sunday's hard-fought Premier League draw with Manchester City, Reds' boss Kenny Dalglish shuffled his pack, making 7 changes to his starting line-up.

Goals:
Maxi 58'
Kelly 63'
A diligent, comprehensive win sealed with two strikes within five minutes around the hour mark. After briefly basking in the afterglow of yet another away win and yet another victory over Chelsea, the result seems somewhat overshadowed by Lucas's frightening knee injury – the last thing the team needed from this poorly-scheduled fixture.

Liverpool sensationally beat Chelsea at Stamford for the second time in 9 days.
They may thank Craig Bellamy for his role in setting up the two goals for Maxi and Martin Kelly in the 2nd-half.
The result stretches Liverpool's unbeaten run to 11 in all competitions and we kept another clean sheet.

Well it's happened again and at Stamford Bridge. It was good to see Ryan Bertrand, Josh McEachran (who was later replaced injured at the end of the first half), Oriol Romeu get another start and Romelu Lukaku get a run out. Oriol Romeu and David Luiz were the stars of the show as far as Chelsea were concerned but that was about it.

Chelsea 0-2 Liverpool | Carling Cup quarter-final match report

The Shed End of this arena, bedecked for the night in the visitors' red banners, was erupting in riotous celebration as Craig Bellamy quietly turned and walked alone back to the centre circle, a player lost in his own thoughts.

Andy Carroll shoots straight at Ross Turnbull with his spot-kick which would have put Liverpool 1-0 up at Stamford Bridge against Chelsea in to-nights Carling Cup Quarter-Finals.

The confirmed Chelsea line up to face Liverpool tonight is:
Turnbull, Bosingwa, Alex, D Luiz, Bertrand; McEachran, Romeu, Lampard (c); Lukaku, Torres, Malouda. - subs: Hilario, Ferreira, Ivanovic, Ramires, Kalou, Mata, Anelka.
Liverpool XI vs Chelsea: Reina, Kelly, Carragher, Coates, Enrique, Henderson, Spearing, Lucas, Maxi, Bellamy, Carroll.

It's back to Stamford Bridge for Liverpool as they seek progression to the semifinals of the League Cup for the first time since 2005. The timing of the fixture makes it challenging for both sides for Liverpool, who've sent out strong squads in each of their three wins in the competition, it's cause for serious questions about who and what we'll see.

Chelsea: Cech, Ivanovic, Luiz, Terry, Bosingwa, Ramires, Meireles, Lampard, Mata, Sturridge, Drogba.
Only six subs named: Turnbull, Alex, Mikel, Malouda, McEachran, Torres. Presumably Ashley Cole was taken injured/ill late on.
Your thought's?
KTBFFH
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Join in for a rant or two on all things Chelsea. Or just some witty banter. We're good at that.

Relive this moment, six times please

Team news forthcoming. And, if the Liverpool match wasn't a 'must win', then this surely has to be? For a ton of reasons.

Sidenote: Anelka has been told by the club that he can leave in January.

Chelsea's team this afternoon against Liverpool has been confirmed and it is as follows:
Cech; Ivanovic, D Luiz, JT (c), Cole; Ramires, Mikel, Lampard; Mata, Drogba, Malouda - subs: Turnbull, Bosingwa, Romeu, Meireles, Sturridge, Anelka, Torres.
Your thoughts?
KTBFFH
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It was a scrappy win, scrappier than it really should have been, but it was a win and a clean sheet, so there's an improvement upon the last few weeks.

Matches at Ewood Park provide a bit of nostalgia for me because so far it is the only away ground I've been to.

We have been waiting and wondering what the team will be. Here is our starting eleven tonight:
Cech, Bosingwa, Ivanovic, Luiz, Cole, Romeu, Ramires Meireles, Malouda, Torres, Anelka
...and on the bench:
Turnbull, Terry, Lampard, McEachran, Mata, Sturridge, Kalou.
What are your thoughts?

Luckily enough for Chelsea we have our next Champions League game on match day four against Genk in the return game that took place a couple of weeks ago. Genk weren't anything special at the Bridge if we are being honest and this should be another three points for Chelsea tomorrow.
However, playing sides in the Champions League on their own turf at their own ground can turn out to be a very different story.

Everton vs Chelsea Carling Cup Highlights 1-2 Goals Video 2011 Sturridge Kalou Turnbull red card is a post from Soccer Blogger. Follow Soccer Blogger on Twitter

Everton vs Chelsea Carling Cup Highlights 1-2 Goals Video 2011 Sturridge Kalou Turnbull red card is a post from Soccer Blogger. Follow Soccer Blogger on Twitter Everton vs Chelsea 2011 ( Everton vs Chelsea Carling Cup) ( Video Below) Final score and result:- Everton vs Chelsea 1-2 ( Louis Saha/ Salomon Kalou, Daniel Sturridge) Goodison [.

What another great result for Chelsea tonight. Everton away is a hard place to go and get a result, especially having to make the long trip up north in midweek!. This was a game that had everything, three goals, two players sent off and two missed penalties. There was plenty of goal mouth action too and once again frustratingly we failed to keep a clean sheet!

AVB has rang the changes and introduced three youngsters tonight starting against Everton with some big guns on the bench. JT didn't travel along with the suspended Ashley Cole, Didier Drogba and Jose Bosingwa. Ramires isn't ready to play.
The starting Chelsea team is as follows:
Turnbull, Ivanovic, Alex, Luiz, Bertrand, Romeu, McEachran, Malouda, Lukaku, Kalou, Anelka.

OK, we crack on this week with our trip to Goodison Park to take on Everton barely 10 days after beating them at Stamford Bridge in the Premier League. We know that Didier Drogba, Jose Bosingwa and Ashley Cole are all suspended for this one, Essien and Hilario are out injured but we have Fernando Torres back available if need be.

Cruise-control mode. Danny and Frank made sure of that. More after the jump.

Vindicated

Well that was sweet now wasn't it? This was a display a long time in the making, and at last the Blues put together their most complete performance under Andre Villas-Boas.

As is rapidly becoming a tradition around these parts, we open up the debate early in the week for everyone to chime in on their preferred formation, tactics, and player preferences heading into Wednesday's difficult fixture against Valencia. More after the jump:

A moment of contemplation

I doubt you need a primer on what this is all about, but for those tuning in for the first time, we open it up to comments to see what formation you'd expect to see from our beloved brothers in Blue.

Rich may have some quality observations in the morning, but I just wanted to rip apart something I read about the match.

The lede in the Guardian's (awful) recap:

André Villas-Boas's selection may suggest the Carling Cup is of minor importance but after his 10-man team won this entertaining tie on the penalty shoot-out, courtesy of Bryan Ruiz's missed fifth kick that smacked the crossbar and bounced close to the goalline, he will be content.

It took an intense penalty shoot-out for Chelsea to overcome West London rivals Fulham at Stamford Bridge and advance to the next round of Carling Cup.

After a goalless stalemate, which involved another injury for Petr Cech, a knock for Daniel Sturridge, and a red card for Alex, the Blues needed an inconclusive spot-kick from the Cottagers's summer signing Bryan Ruiz to emerge triumphant.

Well after some speculation Chelsea have finally confirmed their team news for tonight and stick with a 4-2-3-1 formation!!. The starting eleven and substitutes are as below.
CHELSEA:
Team News - Cech, Bertrand, Luiz, Alex, Ferreira, Romeu, McEachran, Malouda, Sturridge, Lukaku, Kalou
Chelsea subs v Fulham: Turnbull, Bosingwa, Terry, Mikel, Lampard, Mata, Drogba
What do you think of the Chelsea team and formation for this one?

The journey toward winning another one of these starts here.

Team news and the like from 2:30pm EDT.

Teams sheets:

Chelsea
Cech
Ferreira-Luiz-Alex-Bertrand
Romeu-McEachran
Lukaku-Kalou-Malouda
Sturridge
Substitutes: Turnbull, Bosingwa, Terry, Mikel, Lampard, Mata, Drogba.

So tomorrow night AVB makes his first venture as manager into the League Cup at the third round stage against our local rivals Fulham. Now in his press conference when he took over as manager of the football club, he stressed the importance of trying to win all four trophies we are entered in for this season so bear that in mind in this post.

Chelsea manager Andre Villas-Boas admits Didier Drogba will miss Sunday's clash against Manchester United as the Ivory Coast striker continues to recover from concussion.

Drogba was concussed in a collision with Norwich goalkeeper John Ruddy during Chelsea's 3-1 victory on August 27 and has yet to return to action.

Its easy on transfer deadline day to only focus on the acquisitions made on transfer deadline day. It's almost as if all the other summer signings are suddenly forgotten about, like how the newest toy immediately replaces all the others in their heart.

Well, let's ignore that and gauge our summer acquisitions in full.

Yes, £120m this calendar year on six players and it seems that Chelsea still have every intention on spending more as Roman Abramovich started it, but AVB will take on the blue revolution at the Bridge.
Luiz, Torres, Courtious, Lukaku, Romeu and Mata are the names we have brought to the club and with rumours rife that we are in for Pereira of Porto and a central midfielder, that figure will rise to well over £150m.

Chelsea's #1 goalkeeper Petr Cech has been ruled out for a few weeks after sustaining a knee injury in training. From a fantasy footie perpective, Hilario (4.5M) and Ross Turnbull (4.5M) will battle it out for starts to replace Cech ... Continue reading →