Vesper

Сhеlsеа – Bоurnеmоuth England. Premier League / 14 January at 20:30

https://redditsoccerstreams.org/event/Chelsea-afc-bournemouth/1501639

https://www.vipleague.pm/epl/Chelsea-vs-afc-bournemouth-2-live-streaming

I just got in here is one I will put up more https://www.vipleague.pm/epl/Chelsea-vs-afc-bournemouth-1-live-streaming

If we say 22yo and under CBs are oldest that would be considered 'young' then here are my best guesses for who would make up the list Murillo Castello Lukeba Giorgio Scalvini Jarrad Branthwaite Ousmane Diomande Jorrel Hato Ilya Zabarnyi António Silva Cristhian Mosquera Tomás Araújo Zeno Debast Jarell Quansah Jeanuël Belocian Joel Ordóñez Dean Huijsen Ryan Flamingo Yarek Gasiorowski Pietro Comuzzo Konstantinos Koulierakis Martin Vitík Eduardo Quaresma Christian Mawissa Abakar Sylla Nathan Zézé (now injured though) Otávio El Chadaille Bitshiabu Abdukodir Khusanov (95 per cent gone to Citeh) Koni De Winter Andrew Omobamidele Valentín Gómez Arouna Sangante Mikayil Faye Mamadou Sarr Jair Cunha Brahim Traoré Juma Bah Bram Lagae

sub zero chance Bayern splonks out 77m euros for Nkunku just ludicrous that someone is even quoting that dross without laughing at the source

Nantes handed Nathan Zézé injury blow https://www.getfootballnewsfrance.com/2025/nantes-handed-nathan-zeze-injury-blow/ FC Nantes centre-back Nathan Zézé (19) is set to miss a major part of the remainder of the 2024-2025 Ligue 1 season. Ouest-France reports that the France U19 international is set for an extended spell on the sidelines as medical exams revealed a left malleolus fracture sustained during Les Canaris‘ home 2-2 draw against AS Monaco on Friday. Zézé had to be forced off the Beaujoire pitch with 20 minutes left to play against Les Monégasques. Nantes head coach Antoine Kombouaré previously said that Zézé had sustained an ankle sprain which would have meant Zézé would be absent for six weeks. Unfortunately, medical exams undertaken on Monday revealed the true extent of his injury. Ouest-France understands that Zézé will miss up to three months of action. The Fenerbahçe target‘s absence is expected to compel Nantes to dip into the market for a centre-back. GFFN | Bastien Cheval

here is the CMF we should have bought instead of KDH Lazar Samardžić tracking to (in a full season's mintes) 20 goals, 16 assists he cost Atalanta 16.5m quid, around half what KDH cost

A curated shortlist of left-footed centre-backs ripe for transfer rumours https://www.scoutednotebook.com/p/u23-left-footed-centre-backs-shortlist-mns As I watch players, sort spreadsheet columns and create custom Stathead searches, I find myself building internal shortlists for particular positions, roles or even specific player replacements. Perhaps unsurprisingly, I find myself editing and updating a Saka Understudy database that still does not have a physical form. More recently, however, I keep stumbling across players that all fit the same description: left-footed centre-backs. I am not even looking for them. Admittedly, my next massive SkillCorner piece is based on centre-backs, but not specifically the left-footed variant. Earlier this season, I suggested the future of football is left-footed. This was loosely based on the disproportionate number of left-footed players that made up the top 15 for Shot-Creating Actions: 73.3% of them. This is remarkable when you consider that, according to Mark Thompson’s quick check in 2023, just 27% of players from a pool of 2,800 were left-footed. As for centre-backs, I imagine the rise in demand for left-footers has coincided with the increased responsibility in build-up. While it doesn’t matter which foot you use if you’re heading away ten crosses each game, it does make a difference when receiving the ball on that side of your own six-yard box. I also believe demand has increased yet again due to the inversion of full-backs and other in-possession shapes. At the very least, you might see a left-footed centre-back deployed at left-back to fulfil a similar role. Essentially, the left-sided centre-back has never been more left-sided. Get to the fucking shortlist, Jake. Yes, I know I waffle. It is how I get from brain to paper. When reviewing my list, I noticed that they were born in ascending years: 2001, 2002, 2003, and 2005. So, it made sense to find a representative for 2004 and present a five-player shortlist based on these age groups. I also want to emphasise that the scouting process for these players is not yet complete. I simply wanted to share names I am looking at more closely than others and explaining the reasons why. Mika Mármol 2001 — Las Palmas, Spain For a Squawka video at the start of the season, I suggested Mármol as an alternative for clubs competing for the signature of Jorrel Hato - you will see why he is in-demand later. A year earlier, Llew analysed Mármol’s move to Las Palmas and got it spot on. Again. Read the full thread. In his debut top-flight season, Marmól completed more take-ons and made more successful tackles than any other centre-back in LaLiga. This season, like Hato, he’s been deployed at left-back most often. Due to his height, LB or LCB in a back three is most likely his best position at the elite level. It reduces the potential for his weaknesses to be exploited, mainly his lack of aerial prowess, while maximising his strengths: ball-playing, aggressive defending, mobility and speed. Otávio 2002 — FC Porto, Brazil Within a year, Otávio was signed by Famalicão for €500k and sold to Porto for €12m. Like Marmól, the Brazilian seems to be an extremely aggressive, front-footed defender. Despite standing at 188 cm, he also shares a weakness in the air. On the ground, however, he is a force of nature, making him the perfect cover for an extremely attacking full-back. In recent games, Wenderson Galeno, one of the most productive players during the 2023/24 UEFA Champions League campaign, has been deployed at left-back; he was playing left-wing during that UCL campaign. Of course, Porto are one of the most dominant teams in the Primeira Liga so can take more risk, but Otávio’s ability to cover large spaces makes it an even easier decision to rationalise. I will not say too much more as he features heavily in the upcoming SkillCorner piece I mentioned. For now, trust me. Konstantinos Koulierakis 2003 — VfL Wolfsburg, Greece Frequent MNS readers will not be surprised to see this pick. Konstantinos Koulierakis featured in back-to-back editions earlier this season after posting monster ball progression numbers before a dropping a couple of impressive performances during the November international break. Your new favourite centre-back, the U-21 EURO dream teams, and the cleanest sheets in South America Read full story The Greek international is closer to the throwback style. He wins 60% of his aerial duels and makes plenty of clearances. When he does play the ball, it usually travels a long, long way. He averages 10.7 Long Passes and 1.3 Switches per 90 minutes; both tallies rank him in the top five for 2001+ outfield players in Europe’s Big Five Leagues this season (450+ minutes played). His title as PAOK’s record transfer sale is under threat due to reported Liverpool interest in Stefanos Tzimas. I wonder how close he will get to Kevin De Bruyne’s €76m Wolfsburg record. Bram Lagae 2004 — KV Kortrijk (on loan from KAA Gent), Belgium This was the birth year I did not have an instant pick for. Generation 2004 includes soon-to-be Manchester City centre-back Abdukodir Khusanov and MNS regular Joel Ordóñez. But they are both right-footed. So Llew threw over some suggestions from Slack: I already lean heavily on his insight to provide further evidence for the points I make in this newsletter but I did not want to completely nab the picks. So, I did a little search to look for some alternative names. Football is not played on spreadsheets but I noticed that Koulierakis was the only player on this list so far with a aerial duel success rate above 60%. To fix that, I searched for players born in 2004 and beyond (to provide some context) that had won at least 20 aerial duels this season while maintaining a 65%+ win rate. That returned 12 players: It’s a very cool list which includes another soon-to-be Manchester City centre-back, Vitor Reis, among names that SCOUTED fans will be familiar with. From the five 2004 candidates, only Bram Lagae is left-footed. Brahim Traoré appears to be completely two-footed but in the clips I found he seems to be deployed on the right side most often. I made a note of his name, but he does not make this shortlist. Lagae operates on the left of a back three and seems to enjoy a foray forward. Even though the Belgian gets the spot by default, it is not without merit. If you add a 65%+ Dribblers Tackled threshold to the above list of 12, it shrinks to just four names: Bram Lagae, Jorrel Hato, Yarek Gasiorowski and Vitor Reis. That is very good company to be keeping. That warrants further investigation. Nathan Zézé 2005 — FC Nantes, France At the moment, Nathan Zézé does not do much else but clear the ball. But he has done it more often than any other centre-back born in 2003 or later across Europe’s Big Five Leagues this season. Including 2001+ players, only Murillo, Botond Balogh, Nathan Collins and Illia Zabarnyi have made more. Zézé has the telescopic athleticism we highlighted as Leny Yoro’s standout attribute ahead of the big move to Manchester United (and interest from Real Madrid). I wrote this for Zézé’s entry in SCOUTED50 2024/25: A transfer is inevitable. If not this window, expect to see his name a lot in the summer. TL;DR Here are five left-footed centre-backs I think we will hear plenty of transfer rumours about in 2025:

we better get a damn good low price on Guehi not happy about this he is overrated IMHO I was happy to see him sold

so it just no-documentation rumours ie unproven smears gotcha

a new LB we buy, I would guess The two listed above (Dorgu or El Hadji Malick Diouf) or the more traditional targets (many of whom are hard AF pulls) Nuno Mendes hard AF pull Federico Dimarco hard AF pull Alphonso Davies hard AF pull Theo Hernández hard AF pull Rayan Aït-Nouri Jorrel Hato (can play CB as well) Milos Kerkez Antonee Robinson (but turns 28 this coming summer) Miguel Gutiérrez (but Real Madrid have a buy-back clause) Quilindschy Hartman (but has a horrid injury) Álvaro Carreras Jayden Oosterwolde Bradley Locko Nathaniel Brown Diego León (may be going to Manure)

Chelsea’s knack for letting in late goals is starting to hurt them – they need to fix it https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6049027/2025/01/11/chelseas-knack-for-letting-in-late-goals-is-starting-to-hurt-them-they-need-to-fix-it/ If Chelsea want to get their Premier League season back on an upward trajectory, one of the areas they need to improve is how they see out a game. Chelsea’s run of two points from their last four matches has seen them drop from second in the table to fourth. The gap to Aston Villa in eighth is just four points. There is always more than one factor behind a downturn in results but Chelsea’s defensive weakness in the last 15 minutes of matches should certainly be counted as one of them. Enzo Maresca’s side would be four points better off and level with Arsenal (second) and Nottingham Forest (third) in the league if they had not seen a 1-0 lead at home to Fulham turn into a 2-1 defeat and a 1-0 advantage over Crystal Palace end with a disappointing 1-1 draw. Both games had the same thing in common — their opponents scored the equaliser in the 82nd minute. Chelsea’s knack for letting in late goals has been a growing trend lately. As this table demonstrates, no team has conceded more times in the last 15 minutes of matches over the last nine Premier League fixtures than them. Late goals conceded in last 9 PL games Team Goals conceded Chelsea 7 Brighton 6 Aston Villa 6 Southampton 5 Leicester 5 Fulham 4 Manchester City 4 Liverpool 4 Ipswich Town 3 Crystal Palace 3 West Ham 3 Newcastle United 3 Wolves 2 Tottenham 2 Everton 1 Manchester United 1 Brentford 1 Bournemouth 1 Nottingham Forest 1 Arsenal 0 Suffice it to say it makes for a damning statistic and you could argue that the costly results against Fulham and Crystal Palace were coming because Chelsea had got away with conceding late on three prior occasions. The run began in the game against Maresca’s former club Leicester City in late November. At 2-0 up, Romeo Lavia brought down Bobby De Cordova-Reid in the area and Jordan Ayew scored from the penalty spot in the 95th minute. After looking like they were coasting to a comfortable win, suddenly Chelsea had four nervous minutes of added time to navigate. It was a similar story at Tottenham two weeks later. Chelsea were cruising 4-2 going into added time but Spurs had a handful of shots in a short period and got one back through Son Heung-min. He was remarkably left unmarked in the area as James Maddison passed from the byline following a non-descript challenge by Joao Felix. Again Chelsea found themselves in a needless position of having to hang on. Seven days later, it was Brentford’s turn. Chelsea had a throw-in close to their opponent’s area. Yet they lost possession from the restart and all it took was a simple run and pass from Kevin Schade to put Bryan Mbeumo in the clear. The striker made it 2-1 in the 90th minute and there were another tense eight minutes to see out. Maresca let his unhappiness known in his post-match press conference: “For me no matter how many games we win, there are things (that show) we’re not ready to compete for the title in this moment. A team who knows how to win wouldn’t concede that goal. We were in control of the game except the last 10 minutes where we concede.” Spotting a trend is one thing, finding an explanation for it is another. After Chelsea were beaten 2-0 at Ipswich Town on December 30 — neither goal came in the last 15 minutes — Maresca did admit that his players were starting to feel fatigue due to the intense fixture list. However, that is a little difficult to accept as the major factor for the struggle to see out matches. Most of the players picked for the Premier League have not been involved in the Conference League or Carabao Cup fixtures — and Chelsea were knocked out of the latter after two games. Maresca’s use of substitutes has come under scrutiny of late. Against Brentford and Fulham, he made the same single change of Christopher Nkunku for Nicolas Jackson with seven and 17 minutes to go respectively. At Crystal Palace, his first use of the bench was to replace Jackson with Marc Guiu a minute before Crystal Palace levelled the scores. Noni Madueke then came on for Jadon Sancho in the 86th minute. The unwillingness to use his squad in these three fixtures, particularly if tiredness is a factor, does seem strange to say the least. Even if Maresca has doubts about some of the options available, surely it is better to use fresh legs and make changes when the momentum of a game is clearly going against you. This was particularly the case against Fulham and Crystal Palace. However, he did use four substitutes at Leicester and Tottenham after Chelsea had established a two-goal advantage and that didn’t help avoid a tense conclusion. In the defeat at Ipswich, Maresca made four changes after the team went 2-0 down in the 53rd minute and they posed less of an attacking threat. Maresca’s side have been consistently conceding late goals (Michael Regan/Getty Images) Maybe all this does is suggest Chelsea’s strength in depth is not as good as it needs to be. In fairness, injuries to Reece James, Wesley Fofana, Lavia and Benoit Badiashile, plus Mykahilo Mudryk’s provisional suspension for failing a doping test, have affected Maresca’s ability to rotate. Chelsea have also just not been convincing at the back all season anyway. They have kept just four clean sheets in 20 Premier League games, which is a record that is only going to encourage opponents to attack them until the end of matches. They sit 10th in the Premier League for xGA (Expected goals to be conceded) at 27.07, which is higher than the 24 they have let in. The team’s lack of ruthlessness in attack has to be taken into consideration too. Only Liverpool (50) have a greater number of big chances missed this season than Chelsea’s 48. Perhaps a general drop-off between the first half and the second is part of the equation. There is an indication of this with the aggregate scoreline against opponents this season of 20-11 for the opening 45 minutes of league matches compared with the more narrow 19-13 margin for the second 45. The graphics below on some of their latest fixtures also reflect this. It displays each team’s maximum probability of scoring during every three-minute period in a match (the lighter bars) and the difference between the teams’ scoring chances in that period (the darker bar on the side of the dominant team). The idea is to give an overview of momentum and dominance in the match. A team’s maximum goal probability in each minute can be either possession value (essentially goal probability) or expected goals, whichever is higher. The goal probability is capped at 20 per cent (i.e., 0.20 xG). Anything higher than that is represented by the little white “+” signs at the end of the bar — each + represents up to an additional 20 per cent in goal probability. For example, a team whose best scoring opportunity was a penalty will have “+++” to represent the 0.78 xG chance. Bearing all this in mind, look at how the game changed in the second half of the Fulham game, with Marco Silva’s team having more of a threat while Chelsea had fewer periods in attack of their own. Chelsea increased the intensity after being brought back to 1-1 but still ended up losing: This Tottenham chart highlights the extent of the drop-off by Chelsea in the final stages of that 4-3 victory earlier in the month once they went 4-2 in front: Brentford clearly ended the west London derby the stronger of the two sides as the large red columns suggest: And taking the Crystal Palace fixture as the most recent example, their biggest bars of the match are in the second half of the contest too: Allowances should be made for Maresca’s inexperience as a head coach — this is just his third post and only his second season as a manager in English football. He has also been in charge at Stamford Bridge for six months, so teething problems in getting the balance right are only to be expected. But one year ago, there were similar concerns being raised about Maresca at Leicester after their impressive start to the Championship campaign. When asked by The Athletic ahead of the FA Cup Third Round tie against Morecambe if he has spotted any particular cause for concern as to why this is now happening at Chelsea, Maresca downplayed it as a major issue. “I don’t think it is a case of the players switching off, absolutely,” he replied. “I think that during the season you have moments where you score at the end and you have moments where you concede at the end. You have moments where you score from set pieces and concede from set pieces. I guess that it is just a moment and hopefully, we can avoid that, and start to win games in the last minutes (ourselves) because it is a good feeling for us on the bench to celebrate.” However, with Chelsea’s automatic qualification for the Champions League via a top-four finish under greater threat, he needs to find a solution sooner rather than later.

https://thedailybriefing.io/i/154655738/Chelsea

unless you put up LEGIT, documented sources on this all, I am calling serious bullshit absolutely

🤬🤡👎🏽

El Hadji Malick Diouf

Moises Caicedo has become Chelsea’s least replaceable player https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6046790/2025/01/09/moises-caicedo-Chelsea-analysis-squad/ It has been a while since anyone has used Moises Caicedo as a £115million stick with which to beat Chelsea’s recruitment strategy. You have to go back to December 2023, in fact, and then Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp’s quip that they had been “lucky” to miss out on the Ecuador international a few months earlier, finding themselves outbid after agreeing a £111million fee with Brighton. There are still unlikely to be any regrets at Anfield about the way things have panned out, especially in light of Klopp’s successor Arne Slot transforming Ryan Gravenberch into an elite No 6 this season. But the mockery of the fee has aged very badly. Not because Caicedo has actually been able to live up to that ludicrous price tag — which was always an unreasonable expectation — but because an excellent 2024 has firmly established him as being every inch the world-class midfielder Chelsea believed him to be. There were clear signs in the second half of last season, under Mauricio Pochettino, that Caicedo was overcoming the pressure that accompanied his record-breaking move, steadily eliminating the individual errors that marred a difficult start to life in west London. His spectacular goal from the halfway line against Bournemouth at Stamford Bridge in May was a fitting punctuation mark on months of positive progress. That upward trajectory has continued this season with Pochettino being replaced by Enzo Maresca, who has tweaked Caicedo’s position to make him more of a specialised No 6 in his structured system. The patrolling presence of Caicedo at the base of midfield, snapping into tackles, making smart interceptions and playing sharp passes that put Chelsea on the front foot has been a non-negotiable for Maresca. No player in the squad has played more Premier League minutes than the Ecuador international (1,777), and the only other player to start every one of the club’s 20 league games is their 13-goal top scorer Cole Palmer. Palmer is Chelsea’s best player — and were it not for the blistering form of a certain Egyptian powering Liverpool’s march towards the title, he would probably be the consensus pick as the best in the division — but there is a strong case to argue that Caicedo is the one Maresca would find it hardest to do without. That is not as incendiary a statement as it might initially appear. Almost every Chelsea attack goes through Palmer, and with good reason: his ability to create high-quality shots for himself and his team-mates is unrivalled in the Stamford Bridge ranks. The 22-year-old England international is both the best finisher and the best passer at the club. Losing him for any extended period would force Maresca to significantly tweak the team’s approach in the final third. But other players could temporarily fill part of that huge void — chief among them Christopher Nkunku, whose skill set is far more suited to playing Palmer’s role than that of Nicolas Jackson up front. Maresca also has another skilful, imaginative attacker in summer signing Joao Felix who, like Nkunku, is neither a true striker nor a winger. Chelsea’s attack would suffer mightily if Palmer were sidelined for a significant chunk of a season, but there is enough alternative talent in this squad to replace him in the aggregate for a game or two. The same cannot be said about Caicedo who, at times this season, has resembled the connective tissue holding the entire team together. No player in the Premier League has made more combined tackles and interceptions than Caicedo (93) — an even more remarkable statistic when you consider that Chelsea, who are averaging 58.2 per cent possession in the top flight (second only to Manchester City’s 61.4 per cent), afford him fewer opportunities to rack up either than tough-tackling rivals in less dominant passing teams. It is no surprise to learn that he grew up playing football with Chelsea predecessor N’Golo Kante’s name on the back of his shirt. “He is my idol, everyone knows this,” Caicedo told the club’s official website last month. “As I’ve said before, I just try to help the team and my team-mates. He (Kante) was a very big player for Chelsea. I always watched videos of him and now I try to give my best.” Kante was a unique, generational midfield talent during his Chelsea career from 2016-23. Caicedo has a different style on the pitch but there are shades of the great Frenchman in the speed and frequency with which he reads the play and covers ground to disrupt opposition counter-attacks before they can even begin. And once he wins the ball back, he is an immediate threat to turn defence into attack with a brilliant through pass, as he has done to assist Jackson away against West Ham and Liverpool this season. Maresca rarely takes Caicedo off (Ben Stansall/AFP via Getty Images) There is no other player in the squad even remotely capable of doing what Caicedo does as consistently well as he does it. Romeo Lavia, though hugely talented in his own right, is more Mateo Kovacic than Kante: brilliant at receiving the ball under pressure and jinking away into space or playing a slick pass, but not yet defensively aware enough to be relied upon as the primary midfield destroyer. Enzo Fernandez is better utilised higher up the pitch, where his defensive flaws are less damaging. Maresca has limited his trial of Cesare Casadei as a No 6 to games in the UEFA Conference League, and the young Italian could leave Chelsea permanently this month. Renato Veiga, despite flashing promise as an inverting left-back since joining in the summer, has not even been trusted to play alongside Caicedo in the Premier League since the 1-0 win against Bournemouth in September. Andrey Santos is often cited as the best-equipped alternative on Chelsea’s books, but he is not expected to be recalled from loan at Strasbourg of France’s Ligue 1 this month and, in any case, has produced much of his best football as a box-to-box midfielder. The better course might be to bring Lesley Ugochukwu, regarded internally as having Aurelien Tchouameni-level long-term upside, back early from his miserable loan at hapless Southampton. Caicedo’s importance is further underlined by the fact Maresca has only felt comfortable enough to bring him off twice in the Premier League this season: once in August, when Chelsea were 5-2 up after 76 minutes against Wolves, and in November when his side enjoyed a 2-0 lead away to Leicester. The latter game became unexpectedly nervy after Caicedo’s 81st-minute withdrawal, with Lavia conceding a penalty that was converted by Jordan Ayew. Caicedo winning the ball back against Spurs (Justin Setterfield/Getty Images) No team can avoid becoming reliant on their best players. Maresca last month insisted that Caicedo is good enough to “sit at that table” of elite holding midfielders with Rodri and Declan Rice. He, along with everyone else, cannot fail to have noticed the extent of Manchester City’s struggles to control games and defend transition attacks this season without their injured reigning Ballon d’Or winner. GO DEEPER Acheampong? Chalobah? Guehi? How do Chelsea solve their Wesley Fofana problem? Caicedo has been impressively durable for Chelsea, too; he started their final 20 Premier League games of last season from Christmas on, and not even frequent gruelling long-haul international breaks spent in South America have affected his availability. But even the most physically resilient bodies have a breaking point, and clubs need to be more mindful of those limits than ever as they manage key players through an increasingly crowded schedule. Maresca has wisely limited Caicedo’s involvement in the Conference League to featuring in both legs of the qualifying play-off against Servette of Switzerland in August, and an FA Cup third-round tie at home to fourth-division strugglers Morecambe on Saturday offers a well-timed breather after an intense festive run. Chelsea’s head coach has seen enough in his first six months at Stamford Bridge to be mindful of the possibility that a Premier League top-four finish could well depend on keeping his least replaceable player on the pitch when it matters.

2 5 FT

this angers me!

2 5 great free kick by Rodrygo

yep red card Barca down to 10 men GKer is Barca's huge weakness Szczesny came out of retirement when ter Stegen went down

Wojciech Szczesny probably off with a straight red for tripping Mbappe

Rudiger with a yellow and should be off as he too had a no call for a poor tackle earlier he is starting fights now too losing his head