Talking Tactics: Could Ba and Torres play together?

After his two goal debut against Southampton yesterday, Rafa Benitez was quick to praise Demba Ba after the game but with the big man impressing on his debut, attention switched to a certain Spaniard rested for the game sitting on the bench.

As expected, comparisons to the start Fernando Torres made at the club appeared on social networking sites all over the place and Rafa was asked about the “problem” he has now at the club as to who starts the next game home to Swansea in the League Cup. He said:

“It is always important for strikers to score goals. I prefer to have this problem of choosing who to play up front. You have to be careful with just one and it is important for the team to have different options. They will compete — or maybe we will match them together. Ba played with Cisse at Newcastle so he can play with two strikers. He is clever.”

So the questions I am asking YOU the Chelsea fans this morning is:

Do you think we could play Torres and Ba together and if you do, who would have to miss out?

It’s an interesting situation that we have now at the club after watching Torres’ form dip in and out since the start of the season.

It’s also important to point out that Fernando Torres has made an important contribution to the season so far and is in double figures in all competitions.

So what will Rafa Benitez decide to do? Will he rotate the two and continue with our 4-2-3-1 formation or will he decide at some stage to go with both of them up front and start them together?

I think there is something in that from my own personal opinion. You look at Torres and do not see him as a target man up front. We do not want to lump balls up in the air to Torres and ask him to win headers, we do not want to see Torres dropping deep to come and show for the ball, to hold it up and bring others into play. That’s what I can see Demba Ba doing for us in addition to getting on the end of things as he did yesterday.

We want to see Torres up on the shoulder of the last defender, waiting for that final pass that he can run on to. We want to see him looking at making runs in behind the defence and causing them a different problem to that of Demba Ba.

I think they have the potential to work together but to do that and make it successful is another thing. Who would Rafa have to sacrifice from our current preferred starting eleven to make it happen?

Could we drop the second holding midfielder and change the formation to 4-1-3-2 and keep the Hazard, Mata, Moses combination in behind the front two or would it unbalance the team?

Could we make the switch to 4-4-2 with Mata playing in the middle next to someone like Mikel or Ramires?

What do you think of the options we have now since the arrival of Demba Ba?

Come and post your opinion as I would love to hear from as many Chelsea fans as possible on this today.

Carefree & KTBFFH!