OneMoSalah

Not looking forward to this. Too many injuries which means it’ll be a very untried team. Plus if City decide to go for it they will probably score 3 or 4. Even if they rotate heavily.

Thats their budget apparently for the summer. £250m. I wouldn’t be surprised if they get both.

World Cup performances can also be deceiving as we have seen before. Maybe not for him as from what I’ve seen (CL games mainly) and read hes doing well with Benfica so far (only half a season though) but it has also clouded judgement of clubs in the past on certain players. Not going to pretend like some on here will by saying they’ve watched Enzo Fernandez playing for River Plate and Defensa y Justicia but I am sure someone will say they’ve seen him play from there and that it was obvious he would be whatever he will be then. Theres always one 😂 No doubt he is a good young player, 100%, but I really don’t think hes better than Jude Bellingham. If we could get him or Bellingham for €127m or whatever, I would take Bellingham every single day of the week. I still don’t think we will get Fernandez this January, too much bad blood over this deal already. Or get Bellingham at all. I think TB & co fucked it the minute they went back on their word.

Sad news indeed, 58 is no age to go. First and foremost a top man, an unbelievable footballer and manager. Rest in peace Luca

😂 I would say that anything getting lost in translation would be highly unlikely. In fact it would be 100% unlikely. And that goes for dealing with any club across the world. I severely doubt this ever happens at top tier levels of European football. There is no other way to put it barring the fact we told him and his agent one thing and did the complete opposite to what we told them.

Interesting signing. Looks like the boy from Leipzig is off the cards. Least we’ve got a similar profile and then Cowill on loan.

Still cant get over how fucking bad that pass from RLC to Ziyech is in that video. What an average average footballer overhitting a 6 yard pass. Be a tough ask tonight for a result but Potter could in true Andre Villas-Boas and Maurizio Sarri fashion, get something here when nobody expects it. Don't ask me how but wouldn’t be surprised if we get dominated for 90 minutes and win 1-0 or 2-1.

Have to admit, it doesn’t make sense for you to sell him mid season for less than his release clause. I mean there is the sell on fee percentage River Plate are also due as well which people don’t tend to remember. This is what I didn't understand - why people thought you’d be willing to deal with us for a discounted price at all, or even a structured deal cause theres still half a season to play and CL for you guys. Can’t remember the last time you guys sold a high value players/prospect on the cheap. Even the likes of Oblak who played 26 games cost Atletico €16m, Bernando Silva who played 3 games for your first team cost Monaco €16m, Joao Felix was his €100m + release clause, Nunez was a big fee, Di Maria, Coentrao, even Matic all those years ago €25m, David Luiz €25m… throw in others like Renato Sanches, Joao Cancelo amongst others more recently too. And some of those deals were a lot of years ago so take in inflation and market prices now. Portuguese teams always hard to deal with. Because a lot of the time traditionally Porto and Benfica use the model of buy cheap, develop and sell high to top European clubs whilst also maintain domestic success.

Theres no such thing as a free pass. I fucking hate that term. Was the same pish being thrown around when Frank was here with Roman. And the squad we have now is still better than what we had then. I mean is there really a free pass for Graham Potter based on how things have gone so far? Would you say hes shown enough as Chelsea manager? Mentality wise more so specifically as well? Results wise, what does this season even mean if it doesn’t involve CL football next season? Were closer to 12th than 4th. We are 10th. If we finish in the same position he’s got to go. Whats the point in him blending young players in if we are going to go significantly backwards under him? Which is what its looking like so far. The teams soft mentally. That mentality and attitude has got to stem from the manager first and foremost. I genuinely don’t think the players are having him.

It was the same with Roman and Maria as well. Or Emenalo. Or whatever. Its just standard. Although lets not pretend every decision, transfer, sale or contract negotiation/lack of that these lot have made has worked. Re Enzo - If the stuff re saying we could pay the release clause, then apparently being willing to pay 127m in instalments before completely switching it up to the 85m plus 3 players is true, then wow. Clearly the plan was to hope the players desire to move would force Benfica’s hand (which is stupid because you look at Benfica in the past they don’t sell unless it suits their terms so maybe a lack of knowledge on European football from him) then it would be another huge loss in such a short time for him as it seemed more probable that the deal was done hypothetically before we even made a bid. Then we make a bid and its just not even close. Although I never expected that the deal was ever close. Too complex and too much money for January to pay €106-127m

Seriously I would think that this is more Boehly led than Vivell also. Vivell is barely in the door and we still lack parts of the infrastructure to work with him. He's only a technical director, is he going to he sporting director also? Is it going to be a hybrid role? Is it going to be a more specific role? Plus the time that is needed to get it going efficiently, establishing scouting networks, relationships with clubs and the data side of things is probably not all set up as extensively as at other clubs so I would imagine the blame has to be more with the owner for than Vivell. Particularly for transfers. Someone put it right up there, Boehly has sort of set out with the right intentions. For me though he’s been pretty fucking hopeless so far. That tag will stick with him until he takes a step back and lets football people make these decisions.

Disagree. Our biggest issue is attack. It has been for about 6 or 7 years now. The MF is aging and has some disadvantages but again its not as if the 3 you mentioned are poor players or haven't delivered consistently. Where as in attack, you could say that a lot of them are genuinely poor players ie. Ziyech, Pulisic, Havertz (well hes more inconsistent than poor but his inconsistency makes him very poor/average). If the WC never happened I’d be surprised if anybody was excessively keen on Enzo Fernandez right now. Had heard of him before but I doubt many would of wanted him as eagerly and it is interesting that the club weren’t linked to him before Liverpool and Man City’s apparent interest also during the world cup. Just seems like we’re again going for players that other teams have been on the trail of. As @Tomo said, with a good system in place, we won the CL with Jorginho, Kante and Kovacic. We had worse forwards but ultimately poor forwards is what probably has held us back going another level with Tuchel’s system.

Tbf most players will be looking at how shite we are offensively and defensively for the personnel we have and be thinking fuck that. We are in an awful place atm.

Reports we only ever offered €85m. From the start, the sum is 21m euros short of the release clause. Now theres talk it was that fee and 3 players too, Ziyech, David Fofana (loan) and Andre Santos who hasn’t signed yet (loan). There was no negotiations by sounds of it was just Benfica telling no pay the release clause or don’t bother bidding. Not surprised. Was never confident in getting him so not surprised. Convincing Benfica to agree to terms that aren’t as favourable to them as 106m upfront was always going to be near impossible.

People got excited thinking it was done because the player “was convinced” or it was heavily reported. Did think it would be too good to be true as these sort of deals are never easy. Plus lets be honest, if it were the summer, he would never even consider us so just seemed like a marriage of convenience more than anything as he wants to move now after the WC and we were the only ones willing to make an offer (or it was perceived). Looks like the offer was always €85m but we apparently told Fernandez’s camp we would meet his release clause to agitate him to try pursue a move more forcefully ie. hand in a request/go on strike/whatever. Thinking him wanting to leave would lower Benfica’s price and it has backfired. Not surprised. They hold all the power and always have. I’ve been skeptical of Boehly since he sacked Tuchel. The failed/prolonged recruitment of various footballing people, some of the things he suggested ie All Stars Games, the 443 stories, and more recently now the links to Mudryk who has heavily hinted at and apparently is closing in on a move to Arsenal after they have been pursuing him for best part of a year. He does seem amateur. I wont lie, I dislike how he’s operated so far. He is clueless. But hes not dropped the ball re Enzo. The situation was always going to be a difficult one, I didn’t see us ever offering more than the release clause and getting anywhere due to how we would want to go about structuring payments. It was never going to benefit Benfica in the short term. Even more so being midseason, their still in the CL and the fact Benfica spent €30m on the player and have to pay so much to River Plate, the fee would have to be in one installation to make it viable for them just now. Unless we went and offered something stupid like £175-200m in instalments but I’d doubt that. The signing of the Monaco CB also heavily hints at us not getting or pursuing the Croatian CB from Leipzig. So seems we've given up on him also.

Why are we now competing with Arsenal for Mudryk? I mean if we really really wanted him to start with we should of made an offer before Arsenal did, not after. Not after they’ve been speaking to him for months or after hes been heavily hinting at wanting to move to Arsenal since the summer. Honestly. Todd Boehly is fucking amateur. Useless - like a fucking woodpecker with rubber lips. Its almost as if he has no clue so he’s going after players other clubs are miles ahead of us in negotiations for. Pains me to say it but Gary Neville, Graeme Souness and all the naysayers were right in the summer. Absolutely pathetic.

I actually disagree. I think the signings of players like Ziyech, Werner and Pulisic would of suited us under Sarri a lot more than any other coach because 2 of the 3 of them, they were the sort of players we missed/lacked/needed to upgrade. Werner would of certainly got chances with his movement in a Sarri team in the same way Jose Callejon did and even Pedro did. Ziyech would of been a wide playmaker in the way that Insigne was also. Which suits him well. Guys like Mount and James would of also been significantly important to Sarri also like Hysaj and Zielinski/Hamsik. In the final third we were hopeless with Sarri but really Pedro was the only attacker that suited his system well. Hazard was world class and on his day as good as he wanted to be but him and Willian were guilty of coming towards the ball too much, taking far too many touches or not running off the ball in behind teams. Yes Hazard also had the dependency of the other players to deal with because he had been the key man in the team for years but as a collective relying on him for so long specifically under Jose I think made us such a blunt side because everyone knew the plan was give it to Eden, let him do the rest. In the first two thirds of the pitch under Sarri we made significant progress in terms of building out from the back, passing sequences and working the ball into areas just up to the final third. Even then, goals have always been an issue since we sold Diego Costa so to say Sarri’s football stifled our attack that badly, when really, in the past however many seasons, we’ve struggled to be prolific in a lot of aspects is just selective.

Hopefully yeah. Convincing Benfica will be another thing though. Players will always want to leave certain leagues and want to come here but still I think the “we’ve convinced him” is more like that we are the only club at present who genuinely seem interested in paying the clause/more than the clause. Because its well noted he wants to move this window. If it were the summer window and all the big boys were throwing their cheque books about, we’d likely be 3rd, 4th, 5th choice lets be honest. Lets hope we get it done but not very hopeful re the negotiations with Benfica.

Even with the Spurs result today and Liverpool yet to play, I’d fancy them, Man United and Newcastle with much more of a chance of making top 4 than us at this moment. Mental. I mean even United were an absolute shambles for what 3 years but got a new manager in, shifted Ronaldo and now, it looks like they’re gonna leap frog us this season when nobody would of probably given them the chance. Good to see Conte having a moan about spending money at Spurs though hopefully he leaves there so they go backwards again 😂

We were lucky to go 2-0 up at Bournemouth because you seen again what we saw tonight in the second half against them: a lack of aggression, a lack of compactness, huge gaps down the sides. Set pieces also wow we are so fucking abysmal at them.

Been a bust. Looks like Benitez was right about him, his concentration levels are so so so poor for somebody of his age and experience. Just seems to get sucked in and done far too often. Massively disappointing.

Just said to Sky when they asked for his take on the game right at the beginning “Its a hard earned point” ….. then said we took a step forward against Bournemouth…… Jesus christ. Honestly, he should be sacked for that. This isn’t Brighton. A hard earned point against the team in the bottom 3 of the league. Embarrassing. His mentality isn’t right for the level in which we should be reaching for.

No improvement with Potter. In fact we've regressed. Can blame players for off days yes or not being world class but to be outfought, outdone tactically and look like a team near the bottom of the table in terms of how we defend and how we attack the blame ultimately lies with him. Said it before sacking Tuchel made this season deadrubber. But hey maybe by 2030 Boehly’s big masterplan will have worked….

Defending has been terrible barring Thiago Silva. As bad as it was under Villas-Boas. You’d think we were Brighton against Forrest here. Not Chelsea v Forrest. Abysmal.

We are atrocious. Wow.