King Kante

I'd imagine we have to offer him a minimum of 1+1 with the second year being dependent on number of games/achievements etc.

If we are buying two LB's I'd prefer to buy one of Chilwell and Ruglion and then buy either Gosens or Telles as the second. Tbh, I am ok with Alonso as a LB2 as he provides some plan B options.

Yes it is. For me Silva for a year + a year makes me think of the time Blanc went to Utd and was one of there best defenders and helped the young defensive unit. For me, this deal actually makes quite a lot of sense as he will give us a upgrade on what we have, we could get shot of one of the three main CB's currently on the pay scale and next year we can try and get a Upa or one of the other decent CB's going into a final year or two/with a decent buy out. This actually makes sense. Apparently he has always wanted to play in the PL so to make it happen he is going to take a big pay cut.

I have wanted a red kit for a while. For me, one of my all time favs is the 1992-94 away kit, whilst red is actually a traditional colour for us owing to the pensioners. In the 1960's through to the early 90's we often had red away kits or kits with red in them. This Palace shirt through is atrocious. It is wrong on so many levels. If they wanted to do stripes them do it with white stripes so it is similar to the late 80's/early 90's kits. My fear is that after waiting all this time for a red kit I am going to have to wait another 30 years for another.

Yeah, AM have always felt to me a bit like the Spanish Chelsea. Well for the past 10-15 years anyway.

I would love this to be true but unfortunately there is no evidence Chilwell can actually defend to a high level. Only time he has played at a sustained high level was for three months last season when LCFC were flying and playing on the front foot. That allowed him to bomb up and down without too much defending with his back to goal. Once LCFC's level dropped off, he was the member of the defence that most teams targeted as Ricardo is a better FB and Evans and Sonyu are pretty much no nonsense CB's. The thing people need to consider is that this isn't just Chelsea fans saying it, LCFC fans all say it as well. Honestly, go look at Foxestalk, most LCFC fans will be doing cartwheels if he he sold for above £35m as 80-90% of them think they can do better.

JG is too expensive and too injury prone. Only way we get him is i: a) he goes on strike and AM decide to sell for a reasonable fee, b ) he is able to get some sort of gentleman's agreement with AM. Either way, very unlikely. It is more likely we get Oblak than JG and I give us about a 1% or less chance on that one.

Yeah, Upa has to be a target next season 100%. €42m will be a great deal. The problem is who can we get to plug the gap? Silva? Doubt it as he will likely get some good offers from Italy. Sarr? Sounds like he is off to Barca and I am not actually sure on his ability level as I have not seen him play,, only mentioning him as I know he is highly regarded and is on a free. After that things get difficult. We need a CB but there aren't many about we can take. Romagnoli is almost impossible, Skrinier is also seriously tough and he hasn't been great this season anyway. KK can move but due to age it is accepting that over £100m (fee and wages) are complete sunk costs. Dunk is overpriced. White is completely untested at the top level and is ludicrously priced. Costa at Sevilla is another but he falls into KK territory owing to age. The only one that has made real sense to me so far is Ginter. He seems to be the one that fits the right level of quality (I am going on what others have said and the fact he was a team of the year player), age and supposed price. However, he has said he isn't going anywhere so that doesn't sound promising either.

Yeah, BVB are a bit of a funny one. They are the second biggest team in Germany who play regular CL but kind of act as if they are a big club playing in a small league. Really they should be able to keep most of the players they have.

Modric looks like a rat, so I have always called him Modrat. Also, in England little CM's that get about in midfield are sometimes known as ratters. This to be fair is more Wise/Morris/Verratti type players, but I went with it anyway due to the looks.

Yeah, our transfer business between 08-12 was pretty shocking. In that time, we could've had Alves, Modrat, Kun, Ribery (we picked Malouda instead) and Neymar if it wasn't for a mixture of not ponying up/taking the bad option or having certain Cnut's f*ck us over. Instead we ended up with players like Yossi, Bosingwa, Ramires, Torres and Malouda instead. Some of those of course weren't awful, but what could've been.....

Has anyone seen much of Sarr from Nice? Isn't he a highly rated CB on a free?

He didn't actually perform that much better last season. It was that he had a team with much better defensive structure in front of him. The gf issue is a excuse. The boy is a busted flush.

Yeah, Upamencano should be in our top 3 targets for sure, possibly even be No.1. However, he cannot be had until next year unless someone goes absolutely mental on the price.

I'd pay another team £5m for Batsh*t just so I didn't have to watch him fail to comprehend the offside rule in our colours again.

I didn't say the manager had no voice, I said that their voice was one amongst many. For sure, they will put forward ideas but if that is what they are given is another matter. Kepa could potentially have been a Sarri signing, but it would've needed sign off from a number of others to be agreed. It is why I think Conte went crazy, he likely said Lukaku is No.1 choice but ended up with Morata who was probably his 2nd/3rd or something. However, Conte has a mercurial temperament so he was probably likely to go ape shit whenever he wasn't in control 100% All I was saying with my previous post is that signings at Chelsea are 100% not exclusively down to the manager. They have a say, but it agreement amongst a number of others.

I wouldn't say so. Werner hits the Costa/Kante play book more in that he is a highly rated talent with a low buyout clause for his skill level (to be fair to the club they are very good at doing these deals.) Havertz, is more like a Hazard type signing in that he is rated by everyone and is seen as a generational talent. His signing is one we haven't seen for a while. Neymar is probably the only other time, outside of Hazard that we have tried for this (Pele fu*ked us over on that one) in the past 10-12 years. Regulion I agree is similar. However, at half the cost (although his rumoured buy back is an issue.)

Classic Jose back up GK move. Jose does love having 3 GK's who can all play and not be a complete liability.

I don't know about that. Maybe SFL does want him but his profile also fits the Morata/Kepa/Bakayoko/Batsh*t/Emerson/Barkley play book. I.e. age 21-24, highly rated by a lot of the chattering classes in football and looks like if they flop you would be able to shift without too much of a loss (easier said than done.) SFL may want him but he also fits the profile of player we have been targeting/buying for years.

Of course. I thought I had indicated that with the first part of the post. I added this caveat as playing for Sevilla means it is more likely he has been watched than a bloke from a mid-low table French team or a block from the Turkish league. For me, I only really believe people have seen enough of a player if they are; a) playing for a PL side, b ) playing for a top 10 German side (as the Bundesliga has start to pick up popularity in the UK and we seem to have quite a few decent German posters) c) playing for one of the elite European sides outside of those leagues i.e. Milan, Inter, Real, Barca, Juve, PSG. D) Playing for a big domestic European side that play in the CL/Ropey League a lot i.e. Benfica, Porto, Napoli, Ajax, Sevilla etc. This last category is where it starts to become less likely. Outside of those categories, I am pretty sure it is highlights/youtube clups/stats as the amount of football you would have to watch otherwise is insane. I for instance will usually watch around 4-6 PL games on any match week, a big domestic fixture from one of the German/Spanish/Italian leagues (if there is one that weekend) and then 1-2 matches from each day of the CL/Ropey League when possible (a 5:30 ko then a 20:00 ko). However, even though I watch that amount of football, I cannot vouch for half the players that get touted on here and struggle to see how people have more time to watch even more football than I do.

This is what I think is everyone who has watched him extensively concern. Anyone that bothers can see it being said about him from all quarters.

Jason I think it is quite clear that on here a lot of people just watch YouTube clips and look at stats. That is not necessarily an issue, but as you indicate it is not a great way of evaluating a player as you cannot evaluate the whole player as you do not know a variety of variables such as mentality, physicality, ability to play against top teams, ability to play in the clutch (as the American's like to say) etc. That said, he did get rated best LB in La Liga so he must've done something right. Also as he does play in La Liga it is more likely people may have seen him play a lot rather than some of the others touted such as Cakir and Rajkovic (not saying they are not good players, just saying it seems doubtful people have seen enough full 90 min games from them.) For me, Telles is the one I want as I have seen a fair bit of him at Inter (were I saw potential) and then via Porto in the Ropey League. For me, Telles isn't the greatest defender (but a lot of LB's these days aren't. Robinson for instance is great going forward and getting up and down but just good at defending and he is pretty much rated as the best LB in the world.) Also, he is available for £20m'ish and is currently only on €40k a week, so he wouldn't break the bank.

Nah, LCFC fans have been saying he was sh*t/overrated for a long time. I went to their forum to see what they thought as I am not sold on him and thought I was maybe missing something. Turn's out they had the same opinion as I do. Average player who is vastly overrated and they think they could upgrade fairly easily. If big money comes in most of them will offer to drive him themselves. Only way this works out well is if this is some sort of SFL situation with WHU, although then, I actually rated SFL and had to defend his transfer with other football fans/Chelsea fans for the best part of 18 months after he signed.

I think it has been quite clear for years that the manager does not have a lot of authority in signing player. Sure he has a voice but it needs to go through the committee of some sort. Hopefully Cech does have a big voice and knows what he is doing (we cannot yet tell as he has not been in the job long.)

Nah, a buyout and a cheap gentleman's agreement is her forte. Her previous buyouts include: Costa, Kante, Ba and Kepa. Gentleman agreements: Cesc and Ziyech. I give her credit for those as everything bar Kepa (who was quite clearly a panic buy) where pretty good and we nipped in before other teams. It's when we have to negotiate that things seem to go to pot.