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Listening to Tuchel in his presser today, he seems pretty happy Azpi is locked in for another year, and noted how important he is to the team and squad as the captain. I'd be surprised if he'd be willing to let him go now he's under contract. I actually think there's more likelihood the club giving him an extra year on top of next season to keep him sweet than him being allowed to leave.

It was agreed I assume in his previous contract renewal so not much he can do either way at present. Honestly, I think he's a top professional and if we wanted him to stay he would. Once the ownership is sorted there's always the possibility that if Tuchel wants him to stay they may add a second year to sweeten the deal and tie him down for the forseeable. If our transfer plans move in a different direction then I think amicably the club would let him move on if he wanted to leave. Of course that is more so based on the way Roman has dealt with good club servants in the past. New ownership could have a different approach to things.

Reports seem to confirm that his appearances have automatically triggered the year extension so it does appear that he's tied up for next season. I agree in all of the uncertainty currently running around the club, to know at worst we've got Azpi and Silva locked in for next season is a positive. Hopefully the reports that Rudiger wants to wait until the Chelsea ownership is sorted before making a decision still gives us the chance to get him signed up too.

I don't have a problem with the Ricketts arranging to meet Canoville. In fact I think it's a very proactive move given the negativity surrounding their bid at present. I don't like the idea though that Bruce Buck was present at the meeting. Facilitate it on request for them, but why does he need to be involved? It does feel at present like Buck and Raine want the Ricketts bid to succeed. Things do appear quite shady at present and I'm quite dubious to believe that its a complete level playing field at the moment. It does seem like some are trying to smooth things over for the Ricketts bid. The most worrying thing for me is the reports of how much power the likes of Buck, Marina and Lawrence have over the final decision of the new owners. They may be highly respected within the Chelsea hierarchy but they're not the owners and they're not neutral or an outside party in this matter. Potentially their own futures are linked and possibly dependent on new owners (especially if any of them are determined to remain in their roles at the club). Who's to say that they wouldn't prefer an owner who still see's a role for them over a bid that is better for the overall future of the club. I've mentioned a few times I've never liked or trusted Bruce Buck. The general acceptance is that he was the one within the club pushing for the Super League and I think it speaks volumes that Steve Gibson specifically named him when issuing his statement criticising Chelsea over requested a behind closed doors match against Boro. He comes across as extremely arrogant, but seems more than happy for someone else to front up when difficult questions are asked. I find it a disgrace he made little attempts to deal with media frenzy over the Super League and now under the sanctions leaving Tuchel to deal with it all. I've absolutely no trust whatsoever that he would make a decision that benefits the club over his own personal feelings or benefits and that is the biggest worry currently under all of this.

The success in American sports is so difficult to corelate and compare to success in football. I like the way in which it is structured to try and help worse teams rebuild to challenge through the draft system, etc. I don't follow baseball but I do watch NFL and although there will be teams regularly challenging for a sustained period of time, there has been in recent years a number of teams come from seemingly nowhere to the championship game or even the superbowl (e.g. the Bengals). The one thing though American sports does afford, or possibly even encourage, is getting a team that might be struggling to tank and rebuild for a couple of years before coming back again. My NFL team is the New Orleans Saints and you get the feeling that our window of opportunity for another Superbowl left over the last year or two with Drew Brees retiring and Sean Payton leaving. However we're not a team that is likely to only get 2 or 3 wins during the season as the squad is still competitive so we could end up as a middling team which in American sports can at times seem to be the worst position to get caught into unless you hit gold with some later draft picks or pay through the nose in free agency. This just does not apply to football. You only have to see examples such as Arsenal and United (and earlier than this Liverpool) that when teams lose their competitive edge and drop off, it's extremely difficult to rise back again. Whomever becomes the new owner will be inheriting a very strong, competitive squad with a top manager. We may be one or two pieces away but I don't think we're a million miles away from Liverpool and City and we have a much younger core of players than both of them do. But what we do also have that runs throughout the club, from academy to womens to mens is a winning mentality and the experience of winning trophies. So long as that can be retained we'll remain in the hunt. As soon as you lose that it's trouble. Other clubs have experienced it and sport is cyclical by nature. I just hope the new owners embrace the culture around the club to look to maintain it's position challenging for and winning trophies. You don't necessarily need the deepest pockets for this - just a clear strategy and intelligent recruitment.

Completely forgot about Haaland to be honest! The rest I personally think have more to prove yet (Martinez, Osimhen, Vlahovic) before they're in a conversation to discuss the best strikers in world football. I can understand their valuations placing them all in that bracket though due to their respective ages.

Your list and the obvious (that the top strikers around bar Mbappe are all either approaching 30 or well past it) just goes to show why Tuchel needs to persist with Havertz. He seems to be getting better all the time and I do see him as a consistent goal scorer in the future for Chelsea. But his all round game also suits the rest of the team (i.e. the attacking midfielders and wing backs). Broja is a different option as a more direct alternative and a natural striker but unlike Lukaku he will lead the line with his pressing and work rate, whilst also not carrying the big price tag and big ego baggage. A few weeks ago I felt Pulisic was probably the most disposable of our attackers (not including Lukaku) but his form has much improved recently and he does have that purple patch after lockdown which makes you not want to give up on him. He does seem to be preferred by Tuchel to Werner too who I think has to be the one now on the chopping block. If we could still bring in Dembele to replace Werner and Broja replaced Lukaku, I think we have a more balanced attack that is suited to Tuchel and in doing so will have freed up quite substantial transfer funds to potentially improve other areas of the squad.

I know it's not always as easy as it sounds because you have to find a buyer, but if the club needs to generate it's own transfer funds this summer then there are certainly options to do so and refresh the squad. There's a couple of players out of contract we could look at signing to replace players we could sell on. Sam Johnstone would be a solid backup keeper if he's willing to, and in turn we could look at selling Kepa if it's possible and get his massive wages off the books. In the summer he'll have £30m amortisation value left and it might be the first year where we can possibly get a transfer fee that isn't a million miles away from his value left on the books. And Dembele for me is worth a punt. I know his injury history leaves question marks but he is a genuine game changer. His current form at Barca is proof of that. If we were able to sign him, then we could potentially look at moving Werner on. Again his book value will be somewhere around £30-35m and there will likely still be a market for him abroad, especially in Germany and with the World Cup next season he may be more receptive to a move to be playing regularly. Broja could come back in and I think his characteristics fit Tuchel far more than Lukaku. He still needs to learn and develop but he'd get plenty of game time if he's backup to Havertz, whilst offering a different skill set. This would also free up the ability to sell Lukaku if there is a buyer. We might have to take a bit of a hit on him, but if anyone was prepared to pay somewhere between £60-80m for him I'd be happy to take that and accept it as a mistake.

Don't really get an auction style now unless Roman thinks he's pocketing the money once the sanctions are lifted. Granted if it's going to charity then they may be looking to get the highest amount to donate but from a selfish perspective, if these prospective owners start bidding each other up then surely it means less disposable income at the end to be used for the club once its purchased. There's been multiple reports since the start that it's not just the highest bid and multiple factors regarding plans for the club, stadium, investment, etc. From what it appears Raine have effectively weeded out the weaker bids and these seem to be the ones with the finances and backing in place to make the deal happen. Put a set fixed price in now that all bids agree to and let them sell their plans to the Chelsea board, to the CPO, to the CST. I'd like to see all outline their plans in public to the Chelsea fans. Then decide the best project for the club, no one or nothing else before Chelsea Football Club.

And the Chelsea chairman. I've never liked or trusted Buck and I know he's rubbed the CST and CPO the wrong way in the past. I wouldnt put it past him to push for whoever is willing to keep him in his role at the club. And in my opinion he does have the front to push for the Ricketts bid if he sees fit.

There was talk at the end of last week, I think from a report in the Athletic, that somebody had made an offer who had access to one of the largest wealth reserves available so it would back that up.

Everyone loves a mystery bidder 😂

I actually think he comes across very well.

I think the net worth of Boehly, Wyss and Goldstein combined sits at around £8 - 10bn. They are also being backed by Clearlake Capital which hold around $60bn of assets under management. Reports last week were that Boehly's overall consortium was now over funded, so one would assume the capital is there to buy the club and sort the stadium out. The overall direction of the club moving forward will be interesting to see. From what has been reported, Boehly looks at the Liverpool model of making sure scouting, data, etc is on point and then looking to add a player or two each summer to specifically improve the team but if such a player isn't available then not to buy for the sake of it.

Reports seem to suggest he'd be a minority part of the consortium so I don't think he'd be a key decision maker in the operating of the club. As I said though, at present, the Boehly bid on paper seems the most transparent.

Broughton has said that he has significant investment in his bid, obviously not himself as you mentioned he doesn't have the personal wealth for this. But his experience as Liverpool chairman during an extremely difficult period for them and from what I've read, the general respect he commands seems to make him a very credible person to front a bid, and I would expect someone like him to have found some pretty decent sources of funding. I would assume if he has made the shortlist, there will have to be more transparency soon with his investors but rumours suggest the bloke who owns the Sacramento Kings is one, and Harris and Blitzer are another. Harris and Blitzer currently own nearly 40% of Crystal Palace between them which would create an issue if they can't divest that investment (rumours suggest that they could). I guess one argument however would be would we be willingly accepting of someone prepared to dump an investment at the drop of a hat because a better or bigger opportunity arises. The Boehly bid also fills me with more confidence primarily because (1) he made a bid for us a couple of years ago and therefore has surely done more significant due diligence over a longer period on the club. An investment this large, to carry out the due diligence within a couple of weeks I think has to be a concern; and (2) his inner circle seems to be smaller and they have worked together on previous investments and ventures which I think is important for ensuring there is more likely to be agreement within the board room.

Candy bid is out according to the Athletic. They believe the shortlist will be Ricketts, Boehly, Broughton and possibly Centricus.

I'm certain that the Ricketts bid 'on paper' is the one that Raine and the club wanted to choose. It seems to be transparently the best funded, and some of the bits that have been leaked such as experience owning a sports team, developing a stadium, etc they seem to tick most boxes. I think the fall-out across social media regarding them has spooked Raine and the club and it's delayed all the proceedings. I'm not sure whether they believe delaying the process gives everything chance to die down but I just don't see that happening. If the storm is there already this will just escalate into something incredibly volatile and toxic. At present, from all I've seen the Boehly bid seems the smartest option but let's see how things develop.

The longer this drags on, the more I'm inclined to believe the Ricketts were the preferred bid or at worst on the shortlist and Raine and the club are perhaps spending longer deliberating over this after the opposition to them.

Is there anybody yet linked to us that doesn't have a public political position? I see it's even been reported that Wyss has been supporting political campaigns in the US even when his position I believe doesn't give him the chance to vote over there.

I think most Chelsea fans are accepting that we will no longer have an owner like Roman. However it should be pointed out that despite the huge amounts that Roman has outlaid on the club, he's actually looking at selling for somewhere around a billion profit. Man City's owners could probably point to a similar position themselves in that the value of the club now outweighs the huge amount of money that has been invested into the club. Some of the people looking to buy the club, especially foreign investors with no affinity towards Chelsea, could easily look at a club lower down the league as a longer term investment. Newcastle only cost £300m and already have good capacity at their ground. It would take a number of years potentially to build a club up from a lower position but then again, an investment in Chelsea with the stadium, etc is going to be a much longer term investment too. The premium being paid for Chelsea is the brand. It's already there and already established. But if someone can carry on maintaining the success of the club, potentially growing it commercially (especially in the US if we end up with American investors) and sort out a bigger stadium there's nothing to say that the club couldn't be worth 2 - 3x it's current value in 10-20 years time.

The issues that United and Arsenal have found are nothing to do with money in my opinion, it's management. The Glazer's and Kroenke's shouldn't need to be regularly present at games or at the forefront of the club. Not many football owners are. We haven't done too bad despite Roman barely turning up to watch a game in the last 4 - 5 years. But Roman put a structure of people in place to run the club well in his absence. This is what Arsenal and United have lacked. Arsenal's net transfer spend over the last 5 seasons is over £100m more than ours and United's is well over double. They do spend money, they just haven't spent it well. Arsenal are starting to show some signs of buying what are turning out to be some decent players alongside some good young academy players, and rightly or wrongly they've given full backing to the manager to make decisions on his squad and transfers. Some big names have been bombed out in the last couple of years that they haven't been afraid to write off to be fair to them. I've mentioned previously, for the sum we're looking like being purchased for, I just cannot see how a new owner won't be prepared to continue investing in the club and squad to keep us competitive and challenging for trophies. A drop off could cause a significant impact to the club's value. What is important is when we do spend money, spending it well and getting the right people and players in. We ourselves are guilty just like United and Arsenal of wasting a lot of money on player transfers but our management structure and squad are both better as a starting point.

We're all going to have our own preferences but essentially we have to trust the Raine Group and potentially Roman or his trusted aides to choose who is the most suitable owner to take our football club on. @OhForAGreavsieset out a great list yesterday of things which should really be 'base' requirements for new owners. Anybody who is prepared to guarantee something along these lines I'm willing to give a chance to. Anyone buying off Roman is going to find it incredibly tough in my opinion to win over the fans. However there should be some initial goodwill from just getting us out of these sanctions, especially with the season run-in and the potential to still get our hands on a couple of trophies. Whomever it is that gets us just needs to run with that goodwill and momentum.

Yeah I think you're right that relationship was always strained. If there are positive's to take from it though (1) The CPO showed its strength and power to resist someone as rich and powerful as Roman. It should serve as a warning to any new owner to work with the CPO and not against. (2) The hard work has been done by Roman. Dealing with the CPO and seeing their stance, and the work done on planning for how a stadium could possibly be redeveloped or rebuilt on the Stamford Bridge site. You'd like to think despite relations being strained during that time, it will hopefully lay a groundwork for a new owner to have a more positive relationship working alongside the CPO.

Looks like they're planning to come to London to visit the CST and CPO which makes me assume (1) they are either extremely confident or have been given strong indications they'll be one of the shortlisted bidders, and (2) at least they are hopefully not living underneath a rock or have no care for being disliked. Getting the support of the CST and CPO will certainly be a starting point if they think this is going to work amid the swell of negative perception to them across social media, especially from across the pond.