Transfer Talk Topic

[xceleryx]

3 minutes ago, kev61 said:

Silva's reaction after the Luton game said it all.Of course he should be captain!,he has forgotten more about the game than every player in the premiership knows.

Another stroke of genius  from a clueless manager.Imagine Conor Gallagher captain compared to a player in the hall of fame(no disrespect to Conor).

There's been prior discussion about why Silva may not have been handed the armband officially, some of it quite valid in reasoning at that. 

Don't think it's that big of a deal personally, it's not as if he still can't lead without it. Gallagher taking the armband has been a good choice for me, he's a player that's performed well and is capable of being impactful over 90+ minutes. Plus has the work ethic and energy that can help inspire those around him, even if he may not necessarily be the most accomplished or talented player in the squad.

[ROTG]

1 hour ago, xceleryx said:

Ignoring the fact he can't defend - a common gripe held by Burnley fans last season in the Championship, who dominated possession in most matches and didn't require much depending to be done in general. 

Cucurella has been fine this season when he played, not that you'd ever acknowledge it of course. Can't be praising someone we've purchased from Brighton now, that would ruin your little obsession and require your agenda to pivot. Not that you're not accustomed to twisting situations to suit yourself anyway, or just straight up ignoring factual information when you've been caught out like with Lukaku earlier.

Eh!

For a someone who could not defend quite bizarre that Burnley offered 30m for the lad.

As for Cucurella.  The  player has not improved one iota since his purchase, hence an academy player is ahead of him in the LB position, yet you continue to paint an unrealistic picture of the player. Maybe he will come good in season 3 and make second choice LB

[paulw66]

All this captain is a storm in a teacup. Leaders lead, whether they have a bit of elastic around their arm or not.

I get why Silva wasn't made Captain, as he isn't going to be here much longer, and you're potentially looking for a new one in summer anyway. JT was given the armband in 2004 by JM, despite their being more senior players around. 

I also seem to remember in one game the captain (whoever it was ) went off, and Silva declined the armband. Maybe he doesn't want it ? Maybe letting a younger player with a longer term future have it makes more sense.

We also have a tendency to make a bigger deal of Captaincy in this country than it is. As I said at the start, a player like Silva or JT will lead on the pitch, irrespective of who is wearing the armband. I remember when JT played for England after losing the captaincy, and he was still the main shouter and organiser. 

I know in the Italian national team, they just give the captaincy to the player with the most caps. Until he retires, and so on.

[McCreadie]

4 hours ago, ROTG said:

Eh!

As for Cucurella.  The  player has not improved one iota since his purchase, hence an academy player is ahead of him in the LB position.

Um I’m confused. Which academy player? You don’t mean Maatsen do you?

 

[Mark Kelly]

13 minutes ago, paulw66 said:

.I get why Silva wasn't made Captain, as he isn't going to be here much longer, and you're potentially looking for a new one in summer anyway.

Just to be the devils avocado here , why give it James then ?  He'll be out that door faster than grease  through a goose come summer 

[Rob B]

16 minutes ago, Mark Kelly said:

Just to be the devils avocado here , why give it James then ?  He'll be out that door faster than grease  through a goose come summer 

You don’t genuinely believe that do you? 

[Ham]

31 minutes ago, McCreadie said:

Um I’m confused. Which academy player? You don’t mean Maatsen do you?

 

Colwill. 

[McCreadie]

10 minutes ago, Ham said:

Colwill. 

Ah thank you - he went right out of my head. 

[Sabrina F.]

It's pretty clear Poch's plan was for this season not having to rely on a 39 years old CB, both as a starter and a captain. 

Of course, maybe the issue here is that we have so little technical and dressing room leaders to rely on week in, week out. 

So we're in this weird situation with Thiago where he has to play to stabilize an U23 side as he's one of the few experienced players left but he can't really be a captain when he's about to be a free agent and most importantly 40, while it's clear we still need him right now but Poch's all-press style also needs a highline that doesn't quite fit with the type of CBs we have at the club ... It's the consequences of decisions taken up above Poch's head first and foremost. 

[boratsbrother]

24 minutes ago, Mark Kelly said:

Just to be the devils avocado here , why give it James then ?  He'll be out that door faster than grease  through a goose come summer 

Imho, James will only leave if he finds himself no longer a first choice starter, which would  be down to his awful injury problems not ever likely to go away. If that does happen then I can't see any top club rushing to sign an injury raveged  player who's best days are behind him.

I think this latest surgery is going to his last chance at solving his problems. Fingers and toes crossed all ends well.

 

[boratsbrother]

56 minutes ago, paulw66 said:

All this captain is a storm in a teacup. Leaders lead, whether they have a bit of elastic around their arm or not.

I get why Silva wasn't made Captain, as he isn't going to be here much longer, and you're potentially looking for a new one in summer anyway. JT was given the armband in 2004 by JM, despite their being more senior players around. 

I also seem to remember in one game the captain (whoever it was ) went off, and Silva declined the armband. Maybe he doesn't want it ? Maybe letting a younger player with a longer term future have it makes more sense.

We also have a tendency to make a bigger deal of Captaincy in this country than it is. As I said at the start, a player like Silva or JT will lead on the pitch, irrespective of who is wearing the armband. I remember when JT played for England after losing the captaincy, and he was still the main shouter and organiser. 

I know in the Italian national team, they just give the captaincy to the player with the most caps. Until he retires, and so on.

Unlike Cricket, I honestly think captaincy of a football team isn't that big a deal.  When we were a great team we had several natural leaders. It's those kinds of  characters who'll make a significant difference, not a captain.

[thevelourfog]

11 hours ago, xceleryx said:

You can't force someone who doesn't want to be here to remain, much less expect peak performance out of him. 

Erm ... Isn't that the exact point you're responding to, rather than a challenge to that point?

It's almost as if long contracts actually mean f**k all if players don't want to be here and no one else will pay what you want or need for them. 

12 hours ago, Bison said:

So Maatsen to Dortmund on loan. No obligation to buy being reported and no contract extension either. He'll have one year left on his deal once this loan expires. What type of mismanagement is this? 

If I really strain, I can see a kindness to the player there in that they need and want to play football and we do have responsibilities to employees. One might argue it's a shop window.

Equally, though, we need money and often see that when push comes to shove, other clubs pick their own over loan players they have no long term investment in, so yeah ... A struggle to see how this works out for us. I imagine the club were confident he'd go back to Burnley when they made their bid.

[paulw66]

3 minutes ago, boratsbrother said:

Unlike Cricket, I honestly think captaincy of a football team isn't that big a deal.  When we were a great team we had several natural leaders. It's those kinds of  characters who'll make a significant difference, not a captain.

Exactly this. 

Which one player wears the armband makes little difference. 

[Mark Kelly]

9 minutes ago, boratsbrother said:

Imho, James will only leave if he finds himself no longer a first choice starter, which would  be down to his awful injury problems not ever likely to go away. If that does happen then I can't see any top club rushing to sign an injury raveged  player who's best days are behind him.

I think this latest surgery is going to his last chance at solving his problems. Fingers and toes crossed all ends well.

 

I expect that "we" will want to get him fixed and get him sold to improve the FFP nonsense , that's all , I wouldn't but I expect "they" will

[xceleryx]

 

 

[paulw66]

2 minutes ago, thevelourfog said:

Erm ... Isn't that the exact point you're responding to, rather than a challenge to that point?

It's almost as if long contracts actually mean f**k all if players don't want to be here and no one else will pay what you want or need for them. 

 

That's always been the case, BUT, there are subtle but important differences. 

Lukaku was 28, and given a 5 year deal on enormous money. By the time he'd thrown his toys, we then had to try and offload a 29 year old problem, on circa 20m a year (for 4 more years). 

The players now who have been given long contracts, are largely 21-23. If, after a year or two, they "do a Lukaku", then trying to find a club who might want to pay decent money for a 23-25 year old will be much easier than offloading a 29 year old with no resale value.  Especially, as from what I understand, none of these long contracts have wages anywhere near (not even half) of what Lukaku was / is getting. 

The decision to pay a 28 year old 20m a season for 5 years, is without doubt the worst transfer of the RA era (possible in PL history), and is far more ludicrous than giving a 22 year old a 7 year contract on 100k a week*

*appreciate there is some guesswork with the numbers, but they are illustrative 

[Mark Kelly]

Just now, paulw66 said:

The decision to pay a 28 year old 20m a season for 5 years, is without doubt the worst transfer of the RA era (possible in PL history), and is far more ludicrous than giving a 22 year old a 7 year contract on 100k a week*

 

BuT hE's A pRoVeN gOaL sCoRer.

[thevelourfog]

1 minute ago, paulw66 said:

That's always been the case, BUT, there are subtle but important differences. 

Lukaku was 28, and given a 5 year deal on enormous money. By the time he'd thrown his toys, we then had to try and offload a 29 year old problem, on circa 20m a year (for 4 more years). 

The players now who have been given long contracts, are largely 21-23. If, after a year or two, they "do a Lukaku", then trying to find a club who might want to pay decent money for a 23-25 year old will be much easier than offloading a 29 year old with no resale value.  Especially, as from what I understand, none of these long contracts have wages anywhere near (not even half) of what Lukaku was / is getting. 

The decision to pay a 28 year old 20m a season for 5 years, is without doubt the worst transfer of the RA era (possible in PL history), and is far more ludicrous than giving a 22 year old a 7 year contract on 100k a week*

*appreciate there is some guesswork with the numbers, but they are illustrative 

All agreeable in principle. And all true of players who aren't signed on 7 or 8 year deals, anyway. I think "decent money" is what does the heavy lifting, though. We have paid a lot of money, not just for individuals but across the entire "portfolio" as it were. Some, if not most, of those players are going to be loss-making. And we show no immediate sign of getting CL revenue back. My gut is that we are going to find it much harder to get what will count as decent money for any successful buy than might have been the case in the past, and especially if players take a nigh-on strike approach like Lukaku did.

Lukaku has proven a very bad purchase. The worst, though, I'm unsure of. And that's simply because he was bought at a time we could afford to f**k up. Recent transfers might not be as bad on the face of it, but the consequences might be much worse.

[Bert19]

On 06/01/2024 at 07:25, ROTG said:

Just bring Lukaku home - Cheaper and a better option for this season "oh yes and he scores lot of goals"

Well according to him, home was here, then Inter and we saw how that worked out.  

He's a colossal dickhead and should be nowhere near our squad.  The second he leaves our football club cannot come quickly enough for most of us and probably all of the people running the Club.

On 06/01/2024 at 09:44, xceleryx said:

Sarcasm aside, it's almost as if some signings are made on the basis that they may end up being sold in a couple years time. Not every signing has to be for the first team, a mind-blowing concept I know. 

He cost us like £8.6m, absolute peanuts in this day and age. And there's nothing out there right now to clarify if it's a loan or sale. 

I think there are plenty being made like that by several top end clubs around Europe. 

On 06/01/2024 at 17:10, McCreadie said:

That has been an owner driven systematic clearout (a sizeable part of which was totally necessary) and certainly would have led to a toxic atmosphere last season. There is no evidence to suggest that atmosphere prevails now. Chalobah is likely the only one with the hump. 

I think a lot of the players that left over the last 18 months were specialists in toxic atmospheres.  There had been a clear issue with players having too much sway and not enough actual performance level at Chelsea for a while under RA. 

However you look at it, standards definitely dropped in the 2nd half of RA's tenure and we saw several underperformers and underwhelmers kept around for too long. 

On 07/01/2024 at 08:16, Mark Kelly said:

Hmm selling one of our home grown stand out players to finance a move for a clapped out old carthorse from our hated rivals ? 

It does sound feasible if your the world's most moronic and clueless owners and management consortium .

Those two bellends in procurement must be scouting the world for non scoring non assisting midfielders.

To be fair, if they were doing that then Jorginho & Kovacic would still be here.  They were tip-top at it. 

On 07/01/2024 at 09:13, CarefreeMuratcan said:

Sterling at Chelsea, Mount at United, Jorginho and Havertz at Arsenal, Kovacic at City, Rudiger at Madrid, Christensen at Barcelona, Pulisic at Milan and Werner at Spurs.

Imagine thinking that on the night of 29th May 2021. 

I still say we made a mistake not overhauling several of that squad there and then. Jorginho, Christensen, Alonso and a few others were never going to be as valuable again and we probably should have cashed in and begun the rebuild. 

3 minutes ago, Mark Kelly said:

BuT hE's A pRoVeN gOaL sCoRer.

He's a proven something else too.  It begins with D and ends in 'head' 😁

[Chelsea_Matt]

33 minutes ago, paulw66 said:

Exactly this. 

Which one player wears the armband makes little difference. 

Jose said the same! 💯

[xceleryx]

 

[Bison]

39 minutes ago, thevelourfog said:

Erm ... Isn't that the exact point you're responding to, rather than a challenge to that point?

It's almost as if long contracts actually mean f**k all if players don't want to be here and no one else will pay what you want or need for them. 

If I really strain, I can see a kindness to the player there in that they need and want to play football and we do have responsibilities to employees. One might argue it's a shop window.

Equally, though, we need money and often see that when push comes to shove, other clubs pick their own over loan players they have no long term investment in, so yeah ... A struggle to see how this works out for us. I imagine the club were confident he'd go back to Burnley when they made their bid.

This now makes more sense to be fair:

 

[paulw66]

30 minutes ago, thevelourfog said:

 

Lukaku has proven a very bad purchase. The worst, though, I'm unsure of. And that's simply because he was bought at a time we could afford to f**k up. Recent transfers might not be as bad on the face of it, but the consequences might be much worse.

Well, pound for pound, as a stand alone transfer, it has to be the worst by a mile.

In rough numbers, signed for 95m, and a contract worth roughly 100m, so a 195m outlay and he has played 44 games, and scored 15 goals for that money. 

What have we recouped thus far:

- Inter, loan fee and or wage contribution

- Roma, loan fee and or wage contribution

Maybe somewhere between 5m and 10m each ? Even 10m each, that means he has cost us 175m.

What will we recoup thereafter? Who knows. SA is our only hope.

Edit - according to various websites, we got a total of 15m in loan fees and his wages were covered. So revised calculation:

Transfer fee 95m. 20m paid in wages year 1, so 115m. 15m received in loan fees, so outlay now 100m, but with 2 years left of 20m a season. If we can give him away for nothing in the summer, he has cost 100m for a season's work. Worst case scenario, we can't shift him and he costs us another 40m 

Edited January 9 by paulw66

[thevelourfog]

6 minutes ago, paulw66 said:

What will we recoup thereafter? Who knows. SA is our only hope.

Probably being dense, what is SA?

(Just realised, Saudi Arabia).

I don't think we're recouping a penny. Best thing that can be said is that we were rich and stable enough for that to not be too much of a problem for his first year or two here.

[paulw66]

1 minute ago, thevelourfog said:

Probably being dense, what is SA?

(Just realised, Saudi Arabia).

I don't think we're recouping a penny. Best thing that can be said is that we were rich and stable enough for that to not be too much of a problem for his first year or two here.

Just edited my post at the end. 

That we were in a position to be frivolous, doesn't make any better a transfer.