Mhsc

Signing of the summer for sure

Yeah... cynically, could be us trying to pump his sale price

I think frustration with Madueke is largely down to his attitude and selfishness. He has basically one move which is put his head down, cut inside and whip away a shot - 1 move he clearly practices over and over. He's surprisingly not THAT good at it for someone who clearly does nothing else and just practices this one thing over and over. That sort of bloody mindedness could pay off one day and he could become a very good player, but it seems like he's years away from it if he ever gets there. Incidents like him (and NJ) fighting over the penalty that was clearly Cole's to take, just goes to show the character along with this sort of selfish and one dimensional approach to the game in which he at all times is the main character. Ronaldo vibes without Ronaldo results (yet). I think he's a hard guy to like from that perspective but I do see the vision for project Madueke and I could imagine us at some point regretting selling him if he just spends years grinding at the cut inside and finish move like he has been, it also took Mo Salah ages to put it all together to become the player he is now and not impossible Noni could take a big step forward later too - but we are not in a position to just sit on unlimited players forever, those who do not thrive within a few years have to be moved on here, whether we regret it later or not. Our whole business model relies on us moving on players like Madueke regularly.

Poch broke him with his prehistoric training methods imo, may never be the same again unfortunately

(source)

I imagine the club will lean towards replacing him with someone of similar price as we bought him for that they can repeat the story with - another buy and flip in 2-3 years, do a competent job but probably not set the world on fire, adapt and mature with us, build up their rep / brand a bit and then off they go for some more cashflow. Got to keep this model going of flipping players regularly to cover the huge shortfall from stadium revenues / commercial deals / lack of winning things or we will start to breach all of the spending rules everywhere.

From a sporting perspective, having him available makes sense if he actually wants to stay and compete for 1 more year. He's a classic bench player for a top team which is only a good thing - rather have him than not have him, if he was actually up for it and to play in the way the manager wants him to. But probably he's not, or we wouldn't be in this situation (and he would already have improved more than he has). But we live in a world where our club almost exclusively makes its money (special circumstances excluded like CWC) from player sales, and he is one of the few players we've got that we can sell for profit and actually not be that bothered if he goes. We can also (and maybe will) sell other options like Andrey Santos, Chalobah, Colwill etc. Could make good money on any of them (relative to what they cost which was either little or literally nothing). I'd rather keep Andrey and lose Noni.

Not convinced that is so nailed on. Odegaard is potentially no longer the same player he was. Eze hit or miss. Zubi untested in PL. Gyokeres suspiciously no one has gone for, presumably because they think he's a stat padder putting in numbers in a farmers league that wont translate to here - Darwin Nunez got 26 goals in 28 apps in his final season in Portugal and not sure anyone who is a big scorer in Portugal has moved on and kept anywhere close to those numbers. Jackson Martinez another example. Believe it when i see it. On paper, I'd have thought City still have the best XI in the league if we're assuming players play at their peak and adapt to the league. Then Liverpool (for 1-2 more years). Then maybe Arsenal due to how strong / proven the defence is?

Very possible West Ham are just taking Levy for a ride tbh

Yes but his situation and Palmer's are not really comparable - both in terms of our level of desperation at the time and in terms of the players experience - Palmer already had his bedding in season with City, where they slowly let him adapt to PL and gave him 14 apps over a season he enjoyed so little he demanded to leave in the summer. My point is we're at that point with Estevao and that is a hard place to be, its a lot easier a year or two after they've bedded into PL. We are pretty good at dealing with the players that have had that period but historically pretty shit at ones who have not, although jury is still out if modern Chelsea will do it better or not - depending on what happens in the end with Andrey Santos. It is unlikely he will be patient with us but also unlikely he will actually be ready to slot right in. Most big talents we've had in that situation we've totally bottled it. Hopefully we don't assess him all summer and then decide to do a random poorly thought out PL loan for him like we did with Andrey.

Missed the game, watched the highlights. Not surprised Pedro looked good. I thought there was never a question that he is a very good player, the only question mark really is whether he will be a goal scorer because his non penalty goals has been pretty weak (excl some concerns I have around training ground incidents / match day incidents with him). But he's a versatile, talented guy who can do a bit of everything pretty damn well. Personally I think he's here to fight for Enzo's spot but also potentially play CF depending on opposition. Does feel like a luxury signing when we still haven't sorted out the fundamentals (CB/GK) but pretty excited for next season, we will have a proper bench again and Enzo will have tactical options galore which is where he thrives imo. Bit concerned about Estevao - not got a good record bringing in and integrating players at his stage historically - where they look like they have a huge, insane potential but will need to do a big adaptation and still grow physically and tactically etc. Suspect we'll flounder with him for a year with him playing bit part role and then loan him, then he may get disgruntled and demand a transfer before we get to see the player he can become. We'll see.

On the bench

Jesus. Another reminder that life is fragile and short. 3 small children and a wife who is now a widow. His parents have now just lost both of their children in one instant too. Unbelievable tragedy.

Fabrizio saying we are “exploring” the CB market

What exactly is PL proven about him? He's basically flopped. 5G 3A. Guy hasn't even performed as well as Noni Madueke despite playing more games.

Yes definitely. I assume that was always only desperation. We have made signings to fix that now. Overall it is hard to understand anything at the mo as suddenly we have Gittens and Joao Pedro and need to understand what exactly the plan is for these two. I am assuming they are playing LW.

If there is any reason he can go tbh it is defos his attitude. Got sort of Ronaldo vibes in terms of selfishness/demanding taking pens etc but doesn't back it up with the numbers/performances. That said I overall like Noni and sort of semi believe in Project Noni. I have enjoyed having him in a way I didn't really with Sancho. At least I can see the point in Noni Madueke. He just isn't executing well enough yet.

Haha have been thinking for a couple of weeks it would be hilarious if we outbid them for him just to raise the price but then also don't move at all and turn the whole thing into a deadline day saga for them

Neto and Gittens will be insanely fast on the counter. Wonder if we're secretly building a park the bus and counter team and try to be a team that win 1-0 and solve the defensive problems without solving the defensive problems (i.e. hide our shit GK + CBs deficiencies by playing super defensive / deep / boring, instead of spending money to rebuild it and be a team that can play attacking and win big without being crazy open at the back). Then maybe we tackle those problems next summer...

Sorry I meant Sancho, typing from my phone

I suppose you can argue these signings make sense as Mudryk / Sancho / Felix / Nkunku replacements I suspect things will not end well with Joao, I like him as a player but I’m not sure there is room for this type of aggressive player in VAR ball. We already struggle with NJ who is comparatively an angel. And the Chelsea bias is real so he will never get the soft treatment he got at cute little Brighton

The problem of course is Bundesliga + not playing for Chelsea. Those numbers are likely to tank while being 2v1'd. The plus side is it might be another player that requires 2v1 defending and occupies players to free up space in the middle.

One table that shows Gittens very favourably: xG and xA from dribbling situations.

Gittens looks like more squad filler tbh, albeit decently well suited to Maresca's system Pretty underwhelming especially for £55m but lets see what he does for us. Who are supposed to be the stars at squad filler FC? Cole Palmer good player but may never be that guy doing insane numbers again, so then who is? Are we supposed to have faith that Delap does big big numbers on the first try? Or there just isn't even ambition to score the huge number of goals it takes to win PL? We still look massively short in terms of attacking threat imo. Upgrading our squad filler is good but it is more of a stabilisation job to get us back into being regularly top 5. Doing well in CWC papering over the situation a bit imo, will get found out in PL again during the season if we don't do something better than this before the end of summer.

I've just been ignoring the whole Gittens thing because I don't know much about him and wasn't worth looking much in case the deal doesn't happen as so many of them don't. Guess it is time to check him out. Usually I try to watch the "player vs team" youtube videos because you see every involvement (good and bad) they had in the game, but even then you still can't see so much (what runs they make, whether they are switched off in moments they should be switched on etc). In the stats he looks very Madueke-esque with slightly better defensive output.