Reading Hold Chelsea as Pirlo Deal Gets Closer

In a way, I’m happy that Reading held Chelsea and we had to come back from two goals down to get this result. For a pre-season period, we have been playing way too impressively.

This being the last friendly and in particular the match before the community shield match against Man Town next weekend, a tough encounter is exactly what I wanted. Reading were very useful pre-season opponents as they went ahead not by one but by two goals by half-time. Though that was against the run of play, it did pose a challenge for the Chelsea team and Ancelotti.

We were our typical self as we sneaked in with two goals in the last two minutes which would do a lot of good for the team morale. As I didn’t see the match, I didn’t know how Ancelotti reacted to our being two goals down by half-time. If you’d seen the match, please do comment on the tactical changes or approach on the pitch.

In a match that was dominated by Chelsea, only in the last minute of the match, Alex (own goal?) rose to head the equaliser to bring some justice to the proceedings. A minute earlier, Kalou had had his moment of relief. I had written only in the last blog that Kalou must be warned as Sturridge and Di Santo are getting some good press.

Kalou had to take his chances and should appear to be ready for the fight for his place. Kalou got only 25 minutes this match but he did score a beautiful goal. There are rumours that Arsene Wenger wants to snap Kalou. My response to this rumour is what Fergie said about Madrid: “I wouldn’t sell a virus to this mob”.

The highlight of the day was the pass from Mikel to Kalou for our first goal. We know that Ancelotti said that Mikel would be a playmaker. The pass that he made today for that goal would make Lampard proud. The weight of the pass was just perfect as it allowed Kalou gather the ball at a place where he had the time and placement for a superb finish. It was made more special because it was the 90th minute.

Is this a new beginning for Mikel? Talking about deep-lying playmakers, it is strongly rumoured that Pirlo would be a Chelsea player soon.

Andrea Pirlo is now a big dividing topic among the Chelsea fans. I’ve already said why we should not equate a waning Deco (even in his last season at Barca) and still-good Pirlo. As TSO once said, there is no such thing called old players or young players, there are only good players and bad players.

You can buy a 20-year old star and he might be off for a Madrid or Barca in a couple of years. Just because we buy someone young, it does not guarantee us six to eight years of football from that young fella. Young players might fetch us a good price when we sell, but that’s not the reason why Roman runs the club. We need players who can contribute to the success of the team.

I don’t think Roman cares too much about resale value of players. Which is why I think a Pirlo that offers three more years of football could even be better than a youngster that can offer around the same number of years.

We can certainly debate on whether Pirlo would have a role in Chelsea. We can surely debate about whether we need a deep lying playmaker from outside. We can definitely debate about the price at which he can be transferred. But let’s not knock him down because he is 30-years-old. A certain other Italian player joined Chelsea at the age of 30 and was later recognised as the best ever Chelsea player and had his shirt number retired.

That’s why there are no old or young players, there are only good or bad players.

If Pirlo can stay relatively injury-free and perform like he does for Milan and Italy, I’d take him. Whether we have a role for him is something I’m not able to judge now. We still do not know Ancelotti’s plans yet. All that we know is that he is going to play a two-striker formation. He still has some players to be sold. We don’t know how, where and how often he is going to use Mikel, Essien, Ballack and Zhirkov. You never know. Some turn of events might make Pirlo’s move somewhat meaningful from Chelsea’s point of view.

The offer of about £6m + Pizarro for Pirlo sounds like good business. Anyway, we seem to be keen to get rid of Pizarro. So £6m + Pizarro is a very good deal for Chelsea. The last time I checked in the club website, I saw 29 first team players in the squad. That’s about three or four more than the ideal number. In whatever deal that we end for any player, I see some of our players being part of the deal.

No point in having Shevchenko or Pizarro when we don’t plan to use them. Well, as I write this, I see this news that Milan probably wants more for Pirlo than what we offer. How about £6.1m + Pizarro?

Meanwhile, Chelsea’s third kit for this season has been unveiled. It is a white kit with light horizontal stripes (what’s it with horizontal stripes this season?). This goes with white shorts and socks as well. It certainly looks nice. So our home, away and third kits are very nice and distinct this season. We have our Chelsea blue for our home kit, a black based away kit and a white based third kit.

Most importantly, all these kits do look good. Off I go. To modify the Chelsea’s away kits in Pro Evolution Soccer 2009