Transfer Talk Topic

[Sleeping Dave]

2 hours ago, thevelourfog said:

So you have no other examples.

It completely matters that it happens so rarely. Why on Earth would any supporter of any club want that club to pursue a strategy that they acknowledge works once in a generation? 

The lottery analogy is the right one, even if used bizarrely. Because what you're talking about is relying on the lottery to be successful. 

Come on. It was so obvious that the players we let go were good enough to play for us. Before they were sold/released but also after. So no, I cannot see how it matters. If you have a winning lottery ticket and you lose it, the problem isn’t that winning the lottery happens so rarely. The problem was that you lost the ticket. 

Genuinely curious what you are trying to achieve here. 

[xceleryx]

11 hours ago, Sleeping Dave said:

Excuses as usual. The real issue here is that bar possibly Barcelona, not sure, we’ve produced an awful lot of players for the big leagues in Europe. Over the three last years we’ve spent £720m. 

The equation is all fucked up here. And I don’t care if “they left by their own accord”. If we have players of that talent and they fee they have to leave us to have a career we have some serious issues mate. 

Not sure how factual reasonings can be deemed "excuses", yet here you are trying to say otherwise because it suits your little tangent.

Guehi upon his return from loan had Rudiger, Christensen, Zouma, Thiago Silva and possibly Tomori (can't remember exactly when he was sold that summer). Plus arguably Azpilicueta for when we were playing 3ATB. So, I mean where exactly did you expect us to slot him in exactly? 

That's why he left, he wasn't better than what we had at the time and first team football was easier to get at a lesser club. 

The academy isn't just there to generate players for ourselves, it's also there to generate profit through developing footballers on a whole. Some may miss out due to timing, some will because there's simply better options ahead of them, and some will be sold because they just aren't good enough. Just because our subsequent business in the market was aimless or poor costing us millions in return doesn't equate that the academy lads sold being wrong. 

[paulw66]

14 hours ago, Sleeping Dave said:

Yea. But 25 PLAYERS just over the last few years? We are well beyond looking for individual reasons for each case, the general trend when it comes to us producing good academy players only to fuck it up is clear. We could have had a marvellous squad with largely home grown prospects. If they really believed that was the way the club wanted to operate I will get you most of them would have stayed on. 

Imagine to spice that up with a handful of true world class players. We’d be challenging every year for all the big prizes. But no, it is apparently more fun to sell them and buy worse replacements for very big money. I’ve been beating this drum for quite a while and is most often met with ridicule. If you stop sticking your head in the sand and try to look up you will see that I’m right. This needs to change asap. The club must understand that for us to be a continuous challenger we can’t have a squad where 90% are bought on big money. If we want to compete for the best players we need to focus our resources on them and not on squad players with questionable attitude from all over the world. Not only are they worse players, you ALSO lose the cultural aspect of building your club with your own. 

Sorry Dave, the tone of this is arrogant as hell..... I'm right, you're wrong is the crux of it

I don't agree. 

When we were at our strongest 2005-2010 and 2015 / 2017 we had ONE academy player.

Man City have dominated for 6 years.... With one academy regular (for 4 of them and 0 for the other 2)

The notion that any club needs a lot of academy graduates in the first team to be successful is, well, just a lie. Sure it can help, and ideally we'd have a few (we do) but it is not a necessity 

[Mark Kelly]

9 hours ago, Floyd25 said:

Although strangely enough, we fielded the first ever foreign 11 under Ken Bates ownership, which I’m sure we got slated for at the time.

We didn't , it was Derby County , we just got the blame 

[asvaberg]

40 minutes ago, Mark Kelly said:

We didn't , it was Derby County , we just got the blame 

Are you sure, Mark?

https://www.chelseafc.com/en/news/article/remember-when-chelsea-selected-first-all-foreign-team-

[chiswickblue]

1 hour ago, paulw66 said:

Sorry Dave, the tone of this is arrogant as hell..... I'm right, you're wrong is the crux of it

I don't agree. 

When we were at our strongest 2005-2010 and 2015 / 2017 we had ONE academy player.

Man City have dominated for 6 years.... With one academy regular (for 4 of them and 0 for the other 2)

The notion that any club needs a lot of academy graduates in the first team to be successful is, well, just a lie. Sure it can help, and ideally we'd have a few (we do) but it is not a necessity 

I think the recent issue of selling academy players that could have been useful first team squad members is less related to how successful we've been, but more related to how disappointing our "big" signings have been since about 2017 onwards. It would be easier to accept selling academy players if we were actually successful, but we haven't been successful recently because of our transfer record and lack of cohesion between squad planning and style of play. This is all linked of course, when you have such a lack of cohesion it also becomes very difficult to successfully integrate academy players.

[Mark Kelly]

18 minutes ago, asvaberg said:

Are you sure, Mark?

https://www.chelseafc.com/en/news/article/remember-when-chelsea-selected-first-all-foreign-team-

Well, I'll have to bow down to Rick Glanville's knowledge but I was absolutely certain it was Derby County 

[xceleryx]

37 minutes ago, chiswickblue said:

I think the recent issue of selling academy players that could have been useful first team squad members is less related to how successful we've been, but more related to how disappointing our "big" signings have been since about 2017 onwards. It would be easier to accept selling academy players if we were actually successful, but we haven't been successful recently because of our transfer record and lack of cohesion between squad planning and style of play. This is all linked of course, when you have such a lack of cohesion it also becomes very difficult to successfully integrate academy players.

The benefit of hindsight allows us to reach that conclusion.

If you listed some of the academy players sold and then compare them to those we replaced them with, for the most part they were either more talented or proven players. The issue of course is, as yo said, that they didn't plan out as well as expected, so it looks worse looking back. Had players like Werner, Havertz, Lukaku and so on delivered as they did prior to joining no one would be battering an eye. 

That's sports in a nutshell though. 

[bertles86]

43 minutes ago, xceleryx said:

The benefit of hindsight allows us to reach that conclusion.

If you listed some of the academy players sold and then compare them to those we replaced them with, for the most part they were either more talented or proven players. The issue of course is, as yo said, that they didn't plan out as well as expected, so it looks worse looking back. Had players like Werner, Havertz, Lukaku and so on delivered as they did prior to joining no one would be battering an eye. 

That's sports in a nutshell though. 

Also I think if we're being fair it's not exclusively those players fault they didn't deliver.

 

Eg We knew when we bought Timo, he's a counter attack maestro so why play him in a possession heavy team where he can do diddly squat, ditto Lukaku and Havertz are best in 4231s which we knew before we bought them. Even TT admitted in some pressers that he had made mistakes because he wanted to play his way and make players adapt. Sometimes the coach must adapt to his or her squad to get the best from them. So some blame for those players, some for the coach and deffo some for the board who bought players knowing they fit a specific system and not ours...

[Thiago97]

1 hour ago, Mark Kelly said:

Well, I'll have to bow down to Rick Glanville's knowledge but I was absolutely certain it was Derby County 

I'm not sure on what the answer is, but there was some noise around Derby during this period and I remember the era quite well. I can see why Derby County was on your mind....this was the era of Stimac, Asajanvic, Baiano, Wanchope and they were a very good to watch collection of foreign players. Probably Jim Smith era from memory

[Sleeping Dave]

5 hours ago, xceleryx said:

Not sure how factual reasonings can be deemed "excuses", yet here you are trying to say otherwise because it suits your little tangent.

Guehi upon his return from loan had Rudiger, Christensen, Zouma, Thiago Silva and possibly Tomori (can't remember exactly when he was sold that summer). Plus arguably Azpilicueta for when we were playing 3ATB. So, I mean where exactly did you expect us to slot him in exactly? 

That's why he left, he wasn't better than what we had at the time and first team football was easier to get at a lesser club. 

The academy isn't just there to generate players for ourselves, it's also there to generate profit through developing footballers on a whole. Some may miss out due to timing, some will because there's simply better options ahead of them, and some will be sold because they just aren't good enough. Just because our subsequent business in the market was aimless or poor costing us millions in return doesn't equate that the academy lads sold being wrong. 

You can find more or less valid excuses for each of these players. He wanted first team football, he likes playing in red, he didn’t like the tea lady etc. 

So you are missing the point big time by looking at each case isolated instead of looking at the trend. The trend is clear and I’m not seeing much that indicates we are about to change. I’m genuinely surprised that people are still trying to find excuses despite seeing the result. Fair enough if you haven’t seen it over the last five seasons, but to try and deny it now when the facts are obvious? 

Oh well. Let’s just keep spending big on foreign 3rd tier players instead of giving our own a fair shot 🤷🏻‍♂️ That has been our transfer strategy for a number of years now. Clearly NOT working. 

[Sleeping Dave]

3 hours ago, paulw66 said:

Sorry Dave, the tone of this is arrogant as hell..... I'm right, you're wrong is the crux of it

I don't agree. 

When we were at our strongest 2005-2010 and 2015 / 2017 we had ONE academy player.

Man City have dominated for 6 years.... With one academy regular (for 4 of them and 0 for the other 2)

The notion that any club needs a lot of academy graduates in the first team to be successful is, well, just a lie. Sure it can help, and ideally we'd have a few (we do) but it is not a necessity 

I never said that - at all. What I said is that we have fucked up one of the best generations an English team has ever produced. And you seem to think that’s nothing to be bothered about? 

Do you disagree that having a squad of the 19 I listed, plus a handful of true world class players would be better than where we are now? 

Also, we can’t compete with City financially. So we have to be smarter than them - right now we are not. We have less money and we’re dumber. 

Our chance to catch up is 0 doing it like this. £720m spent and honestly, we are still well off from challenging. £720m and many of them aren’t better than the academy players we’ve let go.

[Sleeping Dave]

1 hour ago, xceleryx said:

The benefit of hindsight allows me to reach that conclusion.

 

Fixed that for you. 

[Gurj SS]

We do tend to get rid of too many academy players, way too many for a team who prides itself on gloating that they have the best set-up, either they're good enough or at best can help fill the squad while they fight to prove their worth; which means we can use transfer funds for much needed areas.

All this talk of certain players being proper Chels and then Mount not being because he left is way off the mark because it's all until they leave right? Mount was told he wasn't in the club's plans but us fans wanted him to stick around? According to quite a few Chelsea fans on here we've upgraded by bringing in better players; James is crocked and Gallagher is an ok player who either needs to really step up quickly or he will find himself at the age where he isn't seen as a talent any more. What if we cash in on James or he leaves because Gusto goes on to be better purely because he can be consistent and play a whole season without significant injuries? Gallagher is already clutching straws in the squad.

@Sleeping Dave is right in highlighting we have a serious issue in losing our youth players to only go out and spend mega bucks trying to replace them; yes at times you need to spend big but only when required. Probably all of our homegrown players left because they were told they weren't in the club's plans, but then we as fans could clearly see that the players who would play in their place weren't good enough. Just some examples:

Tomori - left and we found ourselves bringing in an aged KK (good player but not at that age), and a crocked Fofana who isn't even as good as Tomori was so it was always a step back regardless of his potential. Tomori partners Silva right now if he's still here. Didn't put a foot wrong really and he has proven selling him was a big mistake with his performances at Milan.

Guehi - We basically got rid of our own potential and signed someone else's (Fofana) for £60m+, I haven't seen Fofana do anything at any point in his career that has looked better than Guehi. The fact that we are linked with him returning is cringe, if he returns it's the end of Fofana unless the club forces the manager to play him. Sarr wasn't anything special to let go of Guehi.

Livremento - Sold a RB/RWB, then used pretty much every squad player as cover in the position, at least use the money if you're going to do that to bring in a Belletti/Geremi; but nah, we're good with doing things the hard way; I'm surprised we didn't see Kepa down the right wing at some point. Such a poor decision and we didn't even make much from the sale so could have held on; is Gusto better? Time will tell, but we only went for Gusto because of the sad state of affairs we experienced due to not having decent RB/RWB cover.

Maatsen - Yes he's still around but no one improves that much in a year that it makes signing Cucurella a good decision, even Hall blazed Cucurella with about 3 apps last season and Maatsen has done more in 1 friendly.

Mount - Carny is really not better and most likely never will be, Mount was told he isn't in the plans but Gallagher is still around; so we've kept the downgrade. If we play 4;2;3;1 then we will need a number 10, one like Mount plays who can go box to box and run his backside off for a whole season.

Tammy - Madness, total madness. I'm not saying he's a world beater by any means but getting rid of a striker who could score goals and then running around in blind panic and just using anyone up top was so bad it was almost as if a Spurs fan made the club's decision for them. We didn't even replace him, we just let his post go vacant and then cried that we had no striker.

Edited July 27, 2023 by Gurj SS

[ROTG]

1 hour ago, xceleryx said:

Had players like Werner, Havertz, Lukaku and so on delivered as they did prior to joining no one would be battering an eye. 

Once again hammering those who cannot defend themselves, In two the first two season Havertz and Werner were at the club and had a quality coach to coach them were part of a team which delivered the following:

Won : CL, UEFA Super Cup Winners, FIFA CWC

Lost:  FA cup finals, Carabao cup, Charity Shield  

Achieved Top 4

What happened last season was down to TB and sacking a quality coach and hiring a nobody. 

 

Edited July 27, 2023 by ROTG

[Mark Kelly]

Just now, Gurj SS said:

 

All this talk of certain players being proper Chels and then Mount not being because he left is way off the mark because it's all until they leave right? Mount was told he wasn't in the club's plans but us fans wanted him to stick around?

Mount - Carny is really not better and most likely never will be, Mount was told he isn't in the plans b

 

 

 

 

 

It's a good post Gurj I get where you are coming from but I have heard absolutely nothing about Mount being told he wasn't in the clubs plans , the club hasn't said much about it other than a very cool announcement when he left pointing to the fact that he was very much in their plans.

I suppose we could point to the zeal with which they are appearing to get rid of any ex youth team player for the benefit of future FFP spending but I honestly felt they wanted Mount to stay 

[xceleryx]

1 minute ago, ROTG said:

Once again hammering those who cannot defend themselves, In two the first two season Havertz and Werner were at the club and had a quality coach to coach them were part of a team which delivered the following:

Won : CL, UEFA Super Cup Winners, FIFA CWC

Lost:  FA cup finals, Carabao cup, Charity Shield  

Achieved Top 4

What happened last season was down to TB and sacking a quality coach and hiring a nobody. 

Yeah, wasn't really criticising them mate. I've been a staunch defender of Werner and the horrendous manner he was used in. I was drawing comparison between how both players played and excelled prior to joining us, and then underdelivered here for a variety of reasons - not necessarily fault of their own. 

Might pay to be a little less eager in trying to shiv next time. 😉

[xceleryx]

25 minutes ago, Sleeping Dave said:

You can find more or less valid excuses for each of these players. He wanted first team football, he likes playing in red, he didn’t like the tea lady etc. 

So you are missing the point big time by looking at each case isolated instead of looking at the trend. The trend is clear and I’m not seeing much that indicates we are about to change. I’m genuinely surprised that people are still trying to find excuses despite seeing the result. Fair enough if you haven’t seen it over the last five seasons, but to try and deny it now when the facts are obvious? 

Oh well. Let’s just keep spending big on foreign 3rd tier players instead of giving our own a fair shot 🤷🏻‍♂️ That has been our transfer strategy for a number of years now. Clearly NOT working. 

Wasn't really missing the point, Dave. I expanded on that further in another comment on someone else's post. 

Merely expressed that some of the names you rattled off left for reasons that would've seen them leave regardless, well before the idea of buying replacements would've been a thought. 

14 minutes ago, Sleeping Dave said:

Fixed that for you. 

Thanks, I don't know what I'd do without you.

[Gurj SS]

9 minutes ago, Mark Kelly said:

It's a good post Gurj I get where you are coming from but I have heard absolutely nothing about Mount being told he wasn't in the clubs plans , the club hasn't said much about it other than a very cool announcement when he left pointing to the fact that he was very much in their plans.

I suppose we could point to the zeal with which they are appearing to get rid of any ex youth team player for the benefit of future FFP spending but I honestly felt they wanted Mount to stay 

I'm in the camp of accepting what players say, or ex-players say, as much as what our club says because it's always a two way street. I follow quite a few of our players and which are now ex-players on my social media account, and I've mentoned this before how surprised I was to see them express sadness at being split up but also leaving the club (at a risk of angering their new club's fans); from what Mount has expressed he was told 6 months ago his days were numbered, I have no reason to believe he's lying but the way our team has been stripped and replaced I'd lean towards him telling the truth. So many have left, if we'd only lost 1 or 2 I'd say fair enough, but I can't wait for the league to start so we can get names on the back of the players' shirts.

Edited July 27, 2023 by Gurj SS

[Ham]

2 hours ago, Mark Kelly said:

Well, I'll have to bow down to Rick Glanville's knowledge but I was absolutely certain it was Derby County 

Maybe the first top flight team?

[Original 21]

So Maatsen is one who’s going to avoid the cull by the looks of it…

[martin1905]

36 minutes ago, Gurj SS said:

I'm in the camp of accepting what players say, or ex-players say, as much as what our club says because it's always a two way street. I follow quite a few of our players and which are now ex-players on my social media account, and I've mentoned this before how surprised I was to see them express sadness at being split up but also leaving the club (at a risk of angering their new club's fans); from what Mount has expressed he was told 6 months ago his days were numbered, I have no reason to believe he's lying but the way our team has been stripped and replaced I'd lean towards him telling the truth. So many have left, if we'd only lost 1 or 2 I'd say fair enough, but I can't wait for the league to start so we can get names on the back of the players' shirts.

He wasn't in the club's plans because he wouldn't sign a new contract and then pushed for a move to United. It's plain and simple. 

If ever there was an example for why we shouldn't care about the youth team then it is Mason Mount. 

I am more than happy with seeing them as nothing more than a commodity and way of making money to bring in players that actually want to be here, with the very odd exception.

We have given more chances to more youth team players than any other team over the past 5 seasons and in that time gone from being one of the best teams in Europe and regularly competing for the highest honours to being mid table and having to start again from scratch.

We spent fortunes assembling the best group of young players anywhere,  spent years coaching them and investing in them not just as footballers but as human beings, gave them everything to succeed and make a very good living from the game. We showed a clear pathway to the first team and gave countless opportunities yet most of those listed just walked away. Mercenaries. The lot of them.

 

Edited July 27, 2023 by martin1905

[martin1905]

24 minutes ago, Original 21 said:

So Maatsen is one who’s going to avoid the cull by the looks of it…

Who'd have thought it. A youth team player that is good enough and wants to be here is given an opportunity.

Damn you Chelsea football club.

Edited July 27, 2023 by martin1905

[Gurj SS]

27 minutes ago, martin1905 said:

He wasn't in the club's plans because he wouldn't sign a new contract and then pushed for a move to United. It's plain and simple. 

If ever there was an example for why we shouldn't care about the youth team then it is Mason Mount. 

I am more than happy with seeing them as nothing more than a commodity and way of making money to bring in players that actually want to be here, with the very odd exception.

We have given more chances to more youth team players than any other team over the past 5 seasons and in that time gone from being one of the best teams in Europe and regularly competing for the highest honours to being mid table and having to start again from scratch.

We spent fortunes assembling the best group of young players anywhere,  spent years coaching them and investing in them not just as footballers but as human beings, gave them everything to succeed and make a very good living from the game. We showed a clear pathway to the first team and gave countless opportunities yet most of those listed just walked away. Mercenaries. The lot of them.

 

The contract wasn't good enough at £200,000 per week, and we'll find ourselves in the same position if we go on to win silverware with the new set of players; if they win a CL or PL and on international duty find themselves earning £100,00+ less than others who haven't won the same then they'll come back and demand more. By that logic James should be on £100,000 per week but he's not, he's on £250,000; mercenery indeed ;)

Reality is if we're to put ourselves in the top bracket of European clubs then everything must match the other teams, we can't have every single thing from club staff, training facilities, silverware, talent, and status, all the same, but not wages; they must also be the same and look after your own first; Sterling on £350,000 per week? That's what upset the apple cart, either set a wage structure and stick to it, get rid of those above the desired wage structure and then set one and stick to it, or expect that players will ask for what they deserve, Sterling has done nothing at all for us but Mount helped win us a CL so he deserved his £250,00 per week.

Edited July 27, 2023 by Gurj SS

[Morgs]

We move Cucurella, Ziyech and Lukaku on and we are in business. 

Starting to really like what I am seeing from Jackson and Nkunku.