Duffer in need of a rest

[eirebhoy]

To put this simply, whether we like to admit it or not, Duff has been poor the last 2 months for Chelsea. He was crap against Birmingham on Saturday. He complained about having to play the China game and other than the Scúnthorpe match he hasn't missed a match for club or country since his first game (53 matches). I don't like seeing players being rested every second week but surely if you are playing an average of 3 matches every 2 weeks your body needs a rest.

The season is almost over so he should play til the end now but he needs a week or two rest (none or very little training) before the Israel game and I hope Kerr realises this. This season will do him good in the long term, I just can't wait til he's back to his best.

btw (http://www.uefa.com/Competitions/UCL/Statistics/Players/TypeStat=A/index.html)

[ColinR]

2: BUT I do think a lot of modern footballers whinge forever about how hard they have it. Didn't Holland string an amazing amount of club games together at one point and Finnan as well???

yeah, but none of them were champions league matches, which at 16/17 extra games in the season are a serious strain.

i makes you notice how good lampard and terry are that their form hasn't suffered at all, whilst playing in all these games as well

[NeilMcD]

Every players is different but Frank Lampard has strung an amazing amount of games togehter over the last few seasons, He has missed very few and it does not do him any harm But every players is different and a great manager know who a to rest and who not to.

[Stuttgart88]

He's definitely lost his early season form alright and looks jaded. Kilbane looks knackered too if you ask me (except on Sunday).

Chelsea's squad has done well. For the first half of the season it was Duff & Robben doing all the damage. Of late it's been Lampard & Cole. The defence has been solid throughout. Whereas at Arsenal it's been all or nothing, they all play great together or they all underperform together.

[Paulie]

When is the CL final? Around the middle of May? Even if it is as late as that we don't have the Israelis here until June 4th giving him nearly 3 weeks without a match which is a reasonable break. No doubt if that were to happen we'd be concerned that he'd not had a competitive game for 3 weeks and might be a bit rusty.

[Eirambler]

Premiership ends May 15, CL final on the 25th, which is quite close to the Ireland game, but that would only be one game between mid may and Israel, which isnt too bad.


And of course if Chelsea dont make the final he'll have a three week break.

[Paulie]

Premiership ends May 15, CL final on the 25th, which is quite close to the Ireland game, but that would only be one game between mid may and Israel, which isnt too bad.


And of course if Chelsea dont make the final he'll have a three week break.


Ok, so the worst case scenario is that he gets a week and a half break. That's not too bad.

[eirebhoy]

No doubt if that were to happen we'd be concerned that he'd not had a competitive game for 3 weeks and might be a bit rusty.
3 weeks without a game but he should get a week or so off to rest.

BTW - Its only recently that Lampard started to work off the ball, he used to just stand around. Duffer never stops running. I remember Mourinho saying he took Duff off withj 15 minutes to go as it gives him a couple of miles less running to do.

[The Legend]

indeed, if England won the world cup with the likes of Lampard it is not as much pain as them winning it with the likes of Beckham.... Dont get me wrong.. its still pain...

[eirebhoy]

They won't win the WC with Lampard cos that means dropping Gerrard or Beckham which won't happen. :) (ie. they won't go far without a holding midfielder).

OT - Duff is trying to run with the ball tonight but is just losing it. It may be confidence... :(

[Green Tribe]

They took him off early tonight, did not see the first half though....

[FarBeag]

The poor guy looked so lost out there tonight as he has for the last few matches.He needs a rest.The only problem is that Joe Cole is playing like a man pocessed and is improving all the time becoming more poplar with the chelsea fans.i hope that this wont affect Duff when Robin comes back as he will go straight into the team.It could work in our favor as Duff would be fresh but i hope it won't be counter productive in regard to his Chelsea prospects.

[tricky_colour]

Mixed performance, almost scored, but 1:1 in the 70 minutes he was on and 2:1 down in the 24 minutes he was off so not bad from that point of view,
he could probably do with a rest but that won't happen untill Robben returns
and it will be interesting to see what happens then after Joe Coles recent performances.

He didn't get much service either, twice he had a chance to break but both
times the ball was played behind him, and when he did get the ball he didn't
seem to have any time or space to run into.

[onenilgameover]

It does seem that as Cole has gone from strength to strength that Duff has gone off the boil somewhat I'm not sure the competition between the two is the reason but it may have somethin to do with it. He has played alot of games and does look like he wants a break. That schedule before the Israel game does'nt look too bad.

[tetsujin1979]

duff look shattered when he came off, Chelsea aren't playing again until the 20th, so he should get at least 5 days off to recover. He had to do a lot of covering between Robben getting injured and Cole making the step up.

[eirebhoy]

He didn't get much service either, twice he had a chance to break but both
times the ball was played behind him, and when he did get the ball he didn't
seem to have any time or space to run into.
He hasn't got much service in the last few games as when he gets the ball he just wastes it. I've never seen him play so bad as he has been recently. I remember he came on at half time against Newcastle full of confidence and everyone wanted to pass it to him.

BTW, we're not the only ones to notice this:
http://www.cfcnet.co.uk/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=6392

[Donal81]

I was thinking of asking my boss for a rest, actually. You know, a few days off with full wages because I'm a bit tired...

Come on lads, his form may have dipped but it's strong enough to keep him in what is currently the best team in England and one of the best teams in Europe. Just a while ago we were raving about how good he was doing to keep his place in a highly competitive squad.

Duff is one of the best players we've ever produced and I'm a huge fan so I'm not taking a pop at him but if he's tired, surely he can consult one of the highly-paid doctors provided for him at Chelsea and see how he can train differently. Maybe an extra morning a week of weights? I know an extra morning of work is asking a bit...

Sorry about the last comment there but any talk of guys - who are making twice or thrice as much money in a week for playing a bit of ball than I do in a year of 40-50 hour weeks - getting tired always bugs me.

[ken foree]

this guy on the chelsea board seemed to say it best:

"I think that Duff's been out of sorts for a while now. Whether that's as a result of being tired, or that maybe he's just concentrating more on his defensive duties, is hard to say. I believe that part of the "problem" is our own expectations. We "expect' Duff to be mercurial every time he plays, and every time he gets the ball. It's natural enough, but it may not be fair on him. A few games recently, I've been disappointed in him, only to revise my opinion when watching a replay - watching again, you can pick up many of the good things he does in a game, that tend to go a bit unnoticed, first time around.

Having said that, it's certainly true that he's not taking-on defenders as regularly as he was doing earlier. And, he has become prone to looking for the free-kick, when a bit more perseverance may have paid dividends. Maybe he's missing Robben? It's possible. He and Cole don't appear to swap sides as frequently as happens when Robben's playing. Duff seems to be staying fairly much on the left - probably to instructions. Maybe that's limiting Duffer to some degree?"

[eirebhoy]

I was thinking of asking my boss for a rest, actually. You know, a few days off with full wages because I'm a bit tired...

Come on lads, his form may have dipped but it's strong enough to keep him in what is currently the best team in England and one of the best teams in Europe. Just a while ago we were raving about how good he was doing to keep his place in a highly competitive squad.

Duff is one of the best players we've ever produced and I'm a huge fan so I'm not taking a pop at him but if he's tired, surely he can consult one of the highly-paid doctors provided for him at Chelsea and see how he can train differently. Maybe an extra morning a week of weights? I know an extra morning of work is asking a bit...

Sorry about the last comment there but any talk of guys - who are making twice or thrice as much money in a week for playing a bit of ball than I do in a year of 40-50 hour weeks - getting tired always bugs me.
I agree with you to an extent in that I hate seeing players moaning about having to play 3 matches in 8 days or whatever. But what I mean by a rest is literally a rest without any training. If you ran as much as Duff did 6 days a week, travelling to the following places in 6 or 7 months you'd be wrecked:

Dublin
Birmingham
London
Dublin
Basel
Paris
Dublin
London
Middleboro
London
Paris (again)
Dublin
Manchester
London
West Midlands
London
Moscow
London
Newcastle
London
Dublin
London
Portugal
London
Portsmouth
Liverpool
London
Manchester
London
North England
London
Dublin
Liverpool
Newcastle
Barcelona
Liverpool
Norfolk
London
Tel Aviv
Dublin
Southampton
London
Munich

I mean, this is a person that said "mostly I just sleep" when asked what does he do in his spare time. Some people can hack running miles every day and travelling every week but I doubt Duffer is one of those. Jaysus, it took me about 5 days to get over the jet lag from Australia.

[Reality Bites]

Ya everyone is noticing how tired he is! loked jaded last night, the least Kerr could have done back after Israel game was give him a break, Duff didn't want to play, McGeady should have played, but i suppose that a different storey

[Slash/ED]

It puts in perspective how utterly retarded making him play in the China match was :)

[Green Tribe]

Maybe we should email this thread to the FAI :D ;) :D

[dr_peepee]

The way he plays he's the type that you're never gonna get 50 or 60 quality games a season from... Similar to Giggs, Owen etc They ALWAYS go down with hammer problems after a good run of games and this is the first season I can remember where Duff has gone so long and hasn't missed at least week or two with a hamstring injury.

His legs are F***** and he's lost a bit of sharpness. I'm glad of this post cos I was in the boozer a few weeks back and when I said I was glad Robben was back because it meant Duffer could get two weeks on the bench I was slated by the lads.

[McCanada]

Whenever I've seen Chelsea and Duff in the past few months, I'm convinced that he's under orders from Jose to really concentrate on the defensive side of things. He showed that side to his game since the start of the year, but since Bridge went down, he's taken it to another level - he's practically a wingback, tracking back so much. I recently watched a recording while erasing tapes of one of last season's Champions League games, and he was taking players on left and right - Clearly, he has not done that this season with our without Robben.

As for Lampard discussed earlier, I really, really dislike him for some reason; I feel the same about Joe Cole (a West Ham thing?). However, it's clear he's worked his ass off and and has been rewarded for it in the last 2 years. He's a walking advertisment for shooting from distance as well, something no Irish midfielder tries on a regular basis, except for perhaps Holland. Lampy is no class act/saint though - wasn't he involved in that video a few years ago, with Rio, Dyer, etc???

[Donal81]

It puts in perspective how utterly retarded making him play in the China match was :)

And if he hadn't played, there would have been loads of people complaining about that too...

[Slash/ED]

And if he hadn't played, there would have been loads of people complaining about that too...

Fine, but he still should never have played no matter how many people whinged about it.

[Donal81]

Fine, but he still should never have played no matter how many people whinged about it.

I'm not associating you with it but it starts to grate after a while on this site that everyone is streetwise after an event, just like Liam Brady, a Monday morning pundit. Kilbane's a legend, Kilbane's rubbish, O'Shea's brutal, O'Shea's doing fine, Kerr's brilliant, Kerr's too defensive, etc, etc. There was a post put up here two weeks ago saying the same thing, that Duff had gone off the boil. The consensus of most was that Duff was doing just fine.

http://foot.ie/showthread.php?t=23137

Duff will score a sweet goal at the weekend and then it's back to Duff's a legend, great season, top of the league, etc, etc.

[Slash/ED]

I agree with you in general Donal, but I said at the time that Duff should not be involved and yeah, I got a bit of stick for it, but I think that it could only have helped the current situation he's in now if he had of flown straight to London from Israel and got some rest.

[Donal81]

I agree with you in general Donal, but I said at the time that Duff should not be involved and yeah, I got a bit of stick for it, but I think that it could only have helped the current situation he's in now if he had of flown straight to London from Israel and got some rest.

Ah, I'm just releasing some mild bile, that's all, it was just sparked by the argument. ;)

He might well be too tired but he could also just be playing a bit ropey for the last two weeks. It happens sometimes, that could be the end of the story.