Mhsc

There's always the small chance he's a die hard Chelsea fan that wants to play for the shirt and happy to take on that £100k a week base salary with performance related bonuses if we hit CL, commits to an 8 year contract with us and becomes our greatest ever player.

I feel like we're gonna score a lot of goals but it will take Poch a while to get us polished at the back, we still look very vulnerable with players losing their man too easily in defense, and Kepa is decent but not the kind of keeper that is gonna hard carry us when young players make mistakes. Gusto looks like an inspired signing but we've sunk so much money into LB and I am still not convinced by our players there, I do not think either Chilwell or Cucu is good at defending vs a fast, skilled opponent and we will be very vulnerable against the 'wrong' opposition, but we've spent so much money on them it feels like we're committed. We've also just got a lack of stability at the back caused by persistent injury problems, which hopefully Malo and Colwill can help solve - probably a backline of Malo, Thiago, Colwill and Cucurella or Maatsen could stay fit for the season pretty feasibly and develop a rock solid understanding of each other. I am expecting Reece and Chilly to drop like flies as always, but hoping Reece moves position and achieves some longevity as a DM.

Looked solid to me vs Brighton, managed to play a fair few progressive passes, made himself available for the ball with confidence, did a good job defending in the box although was a bit rash with tackles outside of the box. If we had an embarrassment of riches in MF we'd probably want to loan him to a PL club at this point, somewhere like Brighton ironically if they lose Caicedo...

Wrong thread

Our first premier league game is 13th August. Imo we make our final bid for Caicedo on Monday, make it a reasonable offer, and "move on" by Wednesday if they've not taken it and try to urgently sign another player - we need someone in with at least 2 weeks prep before the season starts I think. Circle back to Caicedo as a possibility towards deadline day from a position of strength, having signed a good quality MF (e.g. Lavia), after they've been dealing with an extremely unhappy player for a while see what they have to say.

Yeah I agree, he's not really like Drogba in lots of ways but I meant more in terms of the potential impact he will have in our team and how long we might get out of him. Feeling very excited about him.

Nicolas Jackson is Didier Drogba reborn. I'm so excited.

Sick, completely unrealistic fantasies pop into my head sometimes: triple swap deal of Lukaku, Sterling and Ziyech for Mbappe

Agreed Gallagher has looked good in preseason under Poch - he is still obviously a bit more technically limited, frankly less intelligent on the ball player than some of his colleagues but he is absolutely the classic guy that can perform in a system that he's been taught well and he brings a lot of qualities that we shouldn't underestimate. Should only consider selling him in a years time at this point - 100% worth seeing him under Poch, when he DOES play under a manager that suits him it will also help his value, and later we only sell him if we reach a point where we've somehow found some £12m south american who brings everything Gallagher does but is more intelligent on the ball and it becomes obvious the time is right. I think he will absolutely get a bunch of minutes as it stands.

That was concern in back of my mind. Would he need one to play at Strasbourg? I think it would probably be better for him to have a loan anyway, kid too good to have a risk of not being a starter.

Wonder why Maatsen has been playing as a LB before, simply looks too talented to be stuck there.

Thank god for Nkunku. Love to see him when we’ve got Enzo in.

£65m and £330kpw for the next 5 years is one hell of a gamble on him. I didn’t really realise he was on such huge salary with us and that they raised it a bunch when he joined them. Madness.

Havertz getting absolutely slammed by Arsenal fans for his performance today, they’ve finally realised he might not be a midfielder. Fuck knows what his position actually is, we never figured it out either.

I don’t want Cherki here at all, risk of being a broken record here but he has a lot of red flags and for me he needs to break through somewhere else (or stay where he is) and establish himself, show he can either put out the numbers (goals + assists) to make up for his lazy ass bad attitude or he can learn some work ethic and start putting in the miles and the graft for his team and add that to his current output. Just way too early for me, if we signed him it probably should be to loan him ffs. Kudus is a different matter, just obviously a useful addition to the squad and Pochs approach. Probably be in serious contention to start vs Liverpool if we got him.

Wow, from Cherki rumours to Kudus rumours, massively different players. Kudus has an incredible non-penalty xG but shit xAG, while Cherki is the complete opposite with an incredible xAG and shit non-penalty xG. Kudus makes very few progressive carries or passes while Cherki makes an absolute shit load. Confusing fmpov to go from one option to the other - perhaps it is as a result of preseason feedback from Poch or watching the players in USA by PW and LS? I imagine both are being considered mostly to play as 10, much cheaper options than Felix, and good rotation for Nkunku who (depending on Jackson's form and fitness) may have to play as a 9. I think I'm keen. Squad could use him imo, tenacious / clever pressing, really feels like a Poch player whereas Cherki feels absolutely nothing like a Poch player.

De Zerbi in a race to trash his reputation and credibility as a serious person in football.

Imagine we give PSG Lukaku in exchange for Mbappe 💀

now hear me out… we put up whatever it costs for Mbappe, let’s assume 100m at least. We get him for 1-2 years on insane wages, but maybe it’s enough to get us a league title. We agree with him and Real up front that we will allow sale in future, even putting in release clause specific for them perhaps, and in that deal later they use Tchou or Vini Jr to cut the price to something actually affordable for them. We all end up happy. Am I fuckin crazy?

He is a workhorse attacking midfielder with a goal in him. Just nowhere near as technical as a Felix.

Gallagher is not a CM, there is no relation between Santos and Gallagher and either staying or going has no impact on the other

Santos stays no matter what imo.

Yes I agree, 75m on Monday for Tchou and Caicedo immediately walks out of training and makes a public statement lmao. Would love to see it. Either way we win imo. I think Real would really think about it if someone else comes forward looking like a genuine buyer for Mbappe.

He will probably cave and sign for PSG on a deal with a buy out clause and go to Real in a year. Clever handling of the situation by PSG tbh they can’t lose now, dropping him from the preseason tour and acting like they’ll happily not play him again totally forces his hand.

Also, more importantly, WTF is it with Brighton and Liverpool publicly tapping up Colwill? Absolute scum clubs. That is already enough grounds to walk away from Caicedo deal and report them. Let them deal with Caicedo walking out.