Transfer Talk Topic

[Holymoly]

Brighton turning down flat our £80m bid. Time to move on.

[thevelourfog]

Today's rumours all appear to be players don't want to sign for us, or other clubs have a head start. Players where rumours earlier in the week were that terms were agreed and we had established relationships. All such a load of nonsense, isn't it.

[ROTG]

4 hours ago, xceleryx said:

We're talking individual prices for players, not total spending amounts.

So 100m for a player who played 6 months in Portugal and was a world cup winner a good price?

Even when AM set a tone and spent +100m on Felix, at least  he had over 40 games under his belt for Benfica senior team and +30 for Benfica B, Now look at him. he can't buy himself a club 

[ROTG]

12 hours ago, Mark Kelly said:

Let's hope Brighton who need the money, go under. 

They won't go under just back to the Championship within 2 - 5 years. RBZ honeymoon might last until the end of this season

It's also going to be interesting to see how Brighton's new CB turns out if the media are correct and  Chelsea took all Brighton's key scouting persons?

[ROTG]

41 minutes ago, Holymoly said:

Brighton turning down flat our £80m bid. Time to move on.

Time to throw in Cucurella in the deal.. 80m plus him 😀

[My Blood Is Blue]

Personally, I think we should walk away from a Caicedo at this point. We’ve already wasted enough time on it, so we need to move to plan B (hoping the club have a plan B!).

Brighton know the player wants to leave, we’ve offered what I would say is a fair amount, although I’m sure they’re pointing to Rice and the amount Arsenal paid for him, but the difference is that Rice has proven himself in the PL over a number of seasons, whereas Caicedo has only had 1 proper season at this level. I’m not saying they have to sell and clearly, they don’t and won’t unless the fee is much closer to the fee paid for Rice.

We are at risk of going into the season very light in midfield and I really think we need a leader in there, with plenty of experience, whether we did sign Caicedo or not.

[ShedMiddle]

10 hours ago, Thiago97 said:

I can’t say I have seen much of Lavia. He’s only had one season of football at this level though. So you could question the fee as high, but you could also say he has scope for great improvement too. He was also out for 2-3 months of last season I seem to remember, he got injured playing against us.

I suppose my point is, I would say it’s too early to say Lavia not in the same league as Caicedo. Caicedo done really well with the platform he has at Brighton. Lavia had one season at a club that had 3 different managers and were struggling from the start.

My mate is a Saints season ticket holder.  He said it is too early to tell whether he will be great. Sometimes he looks great and others you wonder what he is doing.  He thinks some coaching could sort him out but, thinks it's potential rather than the finished article.

[BMox81]

Could we ask Bayern to pay £40m for CHO like they were going to do a few years back?

[Ham]

6 hours ago, xceleryx said:

Much is a much really. Chalobah is definitely better at present, Humphreys for me still looks quite wet behind the ears as you'd kinda expect. He may prove to have a higher ceiling but right now there's a clear daylight between the two. I'd be sending Humphreys out on loan for the season in the Championship and seeing how he actually fairs before drawing more of a longer term conclusion.

Agree to disagree. 

 

[ROTG]

43 minutes ago, ShedMiddle said:

My mate is a Saints season ticket holder.  He said it is too early to tell whether he will be great. Sometimes he looks great and others you wonder what he is doing.  He thinks some coaching could sort him out but, thinks it's potential rather than the finished article.

No different to Caicedo except he's half the price - Especially when there is actual evidence "cucurella" of what you get when you buy a one season wonder from Brighton

[Sciatika]

I didn't imagine that Lavia was as good as Caicedo. I think Ndidi might be another possibility though I expect to be shouted down about that. However, Caicedo would cost twice as much as those. If he worth that?

[Morgs]

80m plus Cucurella permanently and Humphries on loan - surely they cannot turn that down. 

I think we either get it done in the next couple of days or we never do. I wonder if they want Ziyech or Lukaku? 

Annoyingly, you can see it coming a mile off - Lukaku goes to Brighton and smashes in 25 goals, including a hattrick against us, whilst Ziyech is their player of the year and they sell him to Liverpool for GBP120m next summer. 

Edited July 28, 2023 by Morgs

[ROTG]

9 minutes ago, Sciatika said:

I expect to be shouted down about that.

Yep - lot's of tunneled vision around 😀

[Thiago97]

29 minutes ago, Sciatika said:

I didn't imagine that Lavia was as good as Caicedo. I think Ndidi might be another possibility though I expect to be shouted down about that. However, Caicedo would cost twice as much as those. If he worth that?

He would definitely come into consideration 12 months back. Everything seems to be really quiet with Ndidi in general these days.

I can’t say I seen much of him last season. Majority of Leicester players seemed off form.  He was very useful player the 2-3 seasons before last . 

[Mark Kelly]

Why don't we just get Gilmour back ? I expect Brighton would want £65m mind.

[Morgs]

9 minutes ago, Mark Kelly said:

Why don't we just get Gilmour back ? I expect Brighton would want £65m mind.

GBP165m, a 65 gallon tank of orphan tears, four Faberge eggs, David Attenborough and the Borough of Putney, or no deal. 

[paulw66]

On 27/07/2023 at 10:27, Sleeping Dave said:

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? 

 

Really? That's a massive leap. Lots of good premier league level players, but not that many elite level.

This isn't Scholes, Beckham, Giggs territory. Lots of Phil Neville and Nicky Butt types (which is impressive enough, that's not an insult) 

We'd have been much better off it had been 5 or 6 elite graduates rather than 25 good ones. 

On 27/07/2023 at 10:27, Sleeping Dave said:

 

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? 

 

Well, it is easy to cherry pick and ignore circumstance, but no, I am not convinced it would have worked, largely because too many came through in a short space of time. It would have been virtually impossible to move 19 players from the academy into the first team squad in such a short period without seriously impacting our ability to be competitive. Think about it, 19 players........not even Barca or United, using your two examples ever had more than half a dozen or so. 

You are also ignoring the desires of the individual players. 

Striking out the players are currently here, obviously but you can go through this thus:

RB: James, Livramento........Livramento at 18 wanted to play regularly. His path was blocked, and he didn't want to go on loan, then come back. refused a new contract.

LB: Ake, Maatsen......Selling Ake was dumb. I blame Conte for that, but you are going back 6 years here. 

CB: Christensen, Colwill, Tomori, Guehi, Chalobah........you're not suggesting we can / could have competed for the CL and top 4 with that bunch of centre backs, whom at the time were all very young..........That's five centre backs, so no room for Rudiger, Silva or Azpilicueta

CM: Musiala, Mount, Rice, Gallagher, Loftus-Cheek, Hall    Musiala is a bit of an oddity. Left at 16 to go back to Germany. Again the club wanted him to stay. Rice (this is where cherry picking comes into it) was let go at 14. This isn't a player whose pathway was blocked, or was sold to make money. Someone made a judgement back then that was wrong and released him, I think due to his physical development. Over the last few years I expect we have released hundreds of players of similar age who we never hear of again. RLC, unfortunate bad luck with consistent injuries, and again it seems he wanted to play more regularly somewhere

LW: Iling-Junior No idea about this one

RW: Hudson-Odoi......well, he's ordinary, and has been ever since he got in the team.

S: Abraham, Nketiah.......again, two good PL players. Not elite. I expect Abraham wanted to go and be a first choice player somewhere, which he has. 

On 27/07/2023 at 10:27, Sleeping Dave said:

 

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.

I don't think it is anywhere near 720m, but that's the press for you..........and most of those signings are young, and time will tell. Going over the list, there are very few players who will come back to haunt us. Most will have good careers. The only that worries me is Mount, and he wanted out for some reason (I expect we'll never know the truth)

Like I have said a few times, the problem is we had too many, and some of the better ones didn't want to go on loan, namely Guehi and Livramento, so took a step down in order to play right away. Little you can do in that scenario. 

[boratsbrother]

Although CHO is clearly no longer good enough for us going forward (🙁another Chelsea boy is moving on) I'm quite shocked to see us being prepared to let him go for as little as the reported £ 8  million. I was expecting something in the region of between 15-20 m, but maybe this is an indication of just how far the club think the player has declined and that's all we can get for him now? From us turning down £60 million to now being valued at 8m  at 22 years old is a really sad state of affairs for both player and club.

[Backbiter]

It is, but he's never been the same since his Achilles injury. And he was never as good as the hype suggested, in all honesty. For his sake, I hope he can do well at a new club (he'll no doubt be lethal against us).

[Mark Kelly]

25 minutes ago, boratsbrother said:

Although CHO is clearly no longer good enough for us going forward (🙁another Chelsea boy is moving on) I'm quite shocked to see us being prepared to let him go for as little as the reported £ 8  million. I was expecting something in the region of between 15-20 m, but maybe this is an indication of just how far the club think the player has declined and that's all we can get for him now? From us turning down £60 million to now being valued at 8m  at 22 years old is a really sad state of affairs for both player and club.

Fulham reportedly offered £4.5m, amazing. 

[chara]

@paulw66...agree and have tried to make the point many times in the past...a lot of good EPL/Championmship players but few top of the pile players...because they are few and far between...not as specifics but PC,JT, Ash,SFL Maka Ballack DD....how would any graduate get past any of them in their prime or even just after?

Ake ,who I always liked, was a bit Conor'ish when here and at B'mouth,,,a bit reckless and "enthusiastic" but now at Citeh with outstanding players and an outstanding coach has blossomed and I am pleased for him but elsewhere he would still.I believe...be a good, valued EPL player but no star.

I am not really familiar with the youth set up from such early ages but how many new entrants are there in the system at all ages every year?

Just the amount of players entering the system makes it impossible to accommodate any but the absolute top candidates and there is an attrition rate and disappointment always there..see CHO as an example.

Looking back and at the present day no real gems have been lost,,,a lot of good players but off the top of my head only TC was one that "got away" and that was not the fault of Chelsea....even the jibes about Salah and KDB are not applicable, one because they were not youth products and two because they did not leave Chelsea and a season later become the players they became at Citeh/Liverpool.

I grew up with the myth of the Youth System producing the cream...not just at Chelsea but WHam Manure and for the real OGs Burnley at one time had a brilliant reputation..and look how they have travelled in the wilderness over the years.

The "Acadamy " at Chelsea and elsewhere are just that..same as in the real world..top graduates go on to eventually top jobs..the majority get a good grounding and make a comfortable living and sadly many fall by the wayside for many reasons not related to the graduation skills or in football the skills of the game.

 

Just my sixpeneth...opinion only.

[Blue Moon]

25 minutes ago, chara said:

Ake ,who I always liked, was a bit Conor'ish when here and at B'mouth,,,a bit reckless and "enthusiastic" but now at Citeh with outstanding players and an outstanding coach has blossomed and I am pleased for him but elsewhere he would still.I believe...be a good, valued EPL player but no star.

They didn't call him MiniRuud at Feyenoord for nothing, although that was admittedly a bit of an exaggeration ...

[chara]

2 minutes ago, Blue Moon said:

They didn't call him MiniRuud at Feyenoord for nothing, although that was admittedly a bit of an exaggeration ...

Made me think....the difference (or not) a top coach can make to an individual....could never see GP as any sort of mentor for a top high octane prospect....maybe get a rise from  an average player in a system ...is Cucu an example of that?

[Chelsea_Matt]

58 minutes ago, chara said:

Made me think....the difference (or not) a top coach can make to an individual....could never see GP as any sort of mentor for a top high octane prospect....maybe get a rise from  an average player in a system ...is Cucu an example of that?

Nah. He’s just shit. 😁

[Bison]

So we're seriously going into the season with Kepa as first choice and Bettinelli as his back up?

Hard to believe this just seems normal to so many.