Jype

Would have expected him to be given time till at least a new DoF is appointed before getting the boot. Boehly and his band probably have no clue which manager to appoint that suits our current personnel. In hindsight the writing's been on the wall since pre-season, and more specifically the Arsenal game. Not so much the performances in the pre-season games but the interviews Tuchel gave to the media, basically throwing a lot of players under the bus for not being committed both mentally and physically. The same kind of comments continued into the new season after almost every match, which indicated problems inside the dressing room. What I don't get, however, is the timing of all this. Why was Tuchel being given lots of responsibility regarding transfer targets and player sales if the problems have been looming behind the scenes since pre-season? Now we have lots of players brought in for big money who may not even be good fits for the next manager. Aubameyang was brought in specifically to please Tuchel, while the likes of Werner, CHO, Gilmour were all let go because Tuchel didn't want to keep them. Now less than a week after the window is closed Tuchel is gone and the next manager might well have other ideas? Player power at Chelsea FC strikes again. Even the ones who've previously played well under Tuchel's management seem to have turned shit overnight and it's not been a tactical issue either. It's fucking bullshit but nothing we can do about it really. Just hope whoever comes in can turn things around quickly because nothing's been lost yet and we have the quality to be better than the shite we've seen this season. Potter would be my choice if he can be acquired. Could be willing to go for Pochettino or even Rodgers at a pinch if Potter is unavailable. Just need to stay clear of Zidane.

Big fan of Mount and have always rated him very highly but his form this season has been horrible. His best quality has always been his tireless engine for pressing and last season he even added some productivity in the final third (13G+16A all comps) but now he looks nowhere near the same player. No end product and also looked a bit lazy or uninterested. Is he sulking because of the contract situation or is there another reason? Either way it would do him good to sit out for a few games and sort out his head, though if the alternatives are Pulisic and Ziyech then I don't fucking know anymore.

How is it madness? I fail to see the comparison to CHO's contract because at least James has proven himself to consistently being one of the top3 performers in our team over a 2-3 year period and we have a bunch of other players who've already surpassed the 250k a week mark before so I'd say it's about time the best homegrown talent started being appreciated the same way as the players bought from other clubs for big money. In the last few years Lukaku, Sterling, Werner, Koulibaly, Kante and according to some reports Aubameyang have all received equal or bigger contracts as James just did.

Yeah, doesn't really matter whether it's 5+1 or 6 because chances are he won't play till the full 2028 with this contract anyway. Either it will be extended again in another 3-4 years or if for some reason he wants to leave at some point he'll be sold before this contract ever reaches it's endpoint. Great news anyway. Next club captain for sure.

Yes.

Kepa - Cucurella, Koulibaly, Fofana - Chilwell, Zakaria, Gallagher, RLC - Pulisic, Havertz, Broja

Bettinelli is our 3rd choice keeper and not eligible for the B list because he's older than 21 years old and not club-trained anyway. It matters exactly fuck all whether Broja's included in the A list or the B list because he will still be eligible to play all games in the UCL. Being on the B list is only about age and homegrown status, not about how many games they're going to play. Mind you the likes of Mount, James and Hudson-Odoi were also on the B list for as long as they were allowed to, even in the season we won the damn thing in 2020/21. Mount played 11 games and James played 10 games that season, all while being registered on the B list. If Broja were to be registered on the A list because of 'respect' or some other non-sensical reason, then Chukwuemeka would have missed out because he's not eligible for the B list having not been at the club for a long enough time. By putting Broja on the B list we have actually managed to squeeze in one extra player who might as well get some valuable opportunities to play if/when the group qualification is confirmed and there are still some dead rubber games left to play.

He's an agent who has a long history of helping the club with transfer dealings. https://www.fgsl.biz/clients His company has Chelsea FC listed as one of their clients on their website.

Tuchel hopes to have Aubameyang in the match day squad next week at Fulham. Going to get a mask from the same guy who previously made ones for Rüdiger, Fabregas, Torres and Ba. Looks a much better estimate than the previously reported time out due to the jaw injury.

We'll see. There's an obligatory buy clause included in the loan but it will only get triggered if he plays a lot of games for them. If he doesn't perform they could easily just bury him in the stands like Milan did with Bakayoko to avoid paying a fee for the permanent transfer. In his first start he got hooked at half time even though another one of their CBs had just gotten sent off with two yellowsso early signs aren't so great.

Permanent move for Batshuayi. Some Turkish media reports saying they even paid a 3,5M€ fee for him. Great clear out of the deadwood this summer. Barkley, Kenedy, Drinkwater, Miazga, Musonda, Clarke-Salter, Emerson, Alonso and Batshuayi all gone for good. Only Bakayoko, Baba Rahman and Sarr still remain.

https://www.skysports.com/football/news/11095/12647445/danny-drinkwater-on-his-Chelsea-nightmare-i-wasted-some-of-my-best-years He had a pretty honest interview a couple months ago with Sky Sports, talked about some mental health issues and also about the football. Comes across a very decent guy to be fair. From the club's perspective it would have been nice if he'd accepted a permanent move away with a big wage cut years ago but let's be honest here, who of us would actually leave millions and millions of pounds on the table if you had a contract that said you're entitled to the money? I don't blame him for taking every single penny he was owed because I'd have done the exact same thing if I were in his shoes, it was the club's mistake to offer him that deal in the first place so the only ones to blame were Marina, Emenalo and any others who might have been involved in the decision to sign him.

Hmm, let's see. All reported wages might not be accurate but they're probably in the ballpark, numbers taken from Capology.com Outgoings: Lukaku £325K/wk Werner £270K/wk Saul Niguez £200K/wk CHO £120K/wk Malang Sarr £120K/wk Alonso £100K/wk Rüdiger £100K/wk Barkley £100K/wk Christensen £80K/wk Drinkwater £100K/wk Musonda £40K/wk Kenedy £25K/wk Batshuayi £90K/wk = £86.8M a year saved minus whatever salary compensation is being paid towards some of the loanees' salaries (CHO, Sarr, Batshuayi) as well as Barkley's termination. Incomings: Sterling £325K/wk Koulibaly £295K/wk Fofana £200K/wk Aubameyang £200K/wk Cucurella £175K/wk Zakaria £90K/wk = £66.8M a year plus Gallagher, Broja, Chukweuemeka, Casadei, Slonina salaries however much they are. If we play a guessing game and estimate the outgoing loanee wage compensations to be around half their salaries (apart from Lukaku whose wages are paid in full by Inter) that would lower the total savings from outgoing salaries to around £75M a year. As for the new additions, none of the younger guys are probably on high wages but for five players together the figure probably still adds up to around £10-20M a year so a total increase of £75-85M. £36M a year in savings sounds like bullshit but all added up together it doesn't look like the overall wage bill has increased either despite some new signings on very high wages, though with new deals likely being signed by Mount and James in the near future the total salary bill will go up a little bit given they'll probably get around triple the money they're currently on. Looks to be in a pretty good balance to me.

True, but chances are they could easily have gotten at least a draw which would already have helped them immensely. Before the Palace game they were level on points with City but 12 goal worse off in goal difference, there was absolutely no way of realistically catching that in two games so it wasn't really in their hands. Without the Gerrard slip, assuming they'd have at least drawn, I very much doubt Crystanbul would ever have happened. Losing to us really deflated their motivation levels.

They were a Gerrard slip away from winning the PL title a year before though so while they'd lost Suarez and still had obvious holes in their team let's not pretend they were total mugs all-round. The season before Klopp arrived (14/15) Liverpool spent more than 150M€ on new signings and had just finished another summer transfer window with 125M€ spending just a couple months before Rodgers got the sack, so overall 275M€ on new signings within just over a year before Klopp's arrival. In 2014-2015 transfer market money that was A LOT of fucking cash and I'd argue that compared to the current market values the size of the investment was at the very least an equivalent to what we had in the couple of years before Tuchel's arrival. Klopp inherited a squad that had the likes of Coutinho, prime-Milner, Henderson and Emre Can to build their midfield around and had the likes of Firmino, Sturridge (still good at the time) and Benteke (big investment) as his strike force. Defense and GK were problems for them but it's not like he didn't have a solid basis to start building his team around. In hindsight a lot of that aforementioned 275M€ was spent by Liverpool's previous management on duds who were never good enough to play in a squad wanting to compete for the titles but doesn't the exact same reasoning apply to us as well? The likes of Pulisic, Ziyech, Havertz, Werner were brought in for big money prior to Tuchel's arrival and haven't performed under either of the managers they played for. The expensive duds Klopp inherited had also delivered at their previous clubs but were quickly discarded so Klopp could bring in his own players who ended up being much better. It's not the exact same situation of course but there are certain similarities. I too agree that Tuchel inherited a better squad but then again unlike Klopp he also did drag us from tenth to fourth in his first half-season and also won us the UCL title. We also finished third in Tuchel's first full season, as compared to Klopp finishing fourth in his first full year. Whether we'll follow in footsteps of Klopp's Liverpool and kick on to the next level having brought in players the manager actually wants to build his squad around remains to be seen but at the very least he deserves the chance to try.

In his first season Klopp took over Liverpool after GW8 with the team in 10th place. They finished 8th, gaining 48 points in 30 matches. In the following season they barely made top4, finishing only one point ahead of Arsenal and also fourth again in 17/18 with the exact same points total. They also struggled badly in 20/21, even though they just about made top4 in the end. Would they have sacked him if they finished a couple points worse off in some of those seasons? I don't think so. Klopp's a wonderful manager but this idea it's always been smooth sailing for him is simply not true. Especially early on there were times where they struggled just as much if not more than Tuchel has at certain points but they stuck by him and let him build up his squad in peace. Tuchel's league form leaves a lot to be desired but in cup competitions he's worked wonders and for my money has earned himself a lot of good will in the bank. The window's just over and he's got in good players that he personally wished for but now the hard work begins. If we start falling down the table like we did under Lampard he'll eventually find himself in a position where he's under pressure to start delivering but for many reasons the start of the season (and the second half of last season) hasn't been easy. Some key injuries in midfield and some important signings being left so late in the window has definitely affected our league start but of course he can't keep riding on that excuse forever and things have to improve. Last season Tuchel didn't yet have many of his 'own' players in the team but I'm definitely willing to give him a chance to build something of his own at the club and then see how it goes. This transfer window was a very good start going in that direction: he got in a couple of quality CBs of his own choosing, a new wing-back option, an upgrade over Werner and a striker he'll very likely prefer to Lukaku who I don't think was ever his top pick. There are still some issues to be resolved, especially the long-term midfield replacements for Kante, Jorginho as well as getting rid of Pulisic and Ziyech so a lot of work to be done but as long as we start seeing some developments in the play I'm more than willing to give Tuchel as long as he needs to complete the squad and hopefully then start competing for the EPL title. This season we just need to aim for a top-4 finish, a couple of decent cup runs and then go all-in for next season.

If the player's from a PL club then it's got to be either Neves or Guimaraes. Outside of PL, who knows.

Probably a minor fracture that just prevents him from playing contact sports but doesn't affect his normal life in any meaningful way.

Vale has signed a new deal and is getting a loan. Great news.

He's starting for Leicester tonight, doesn't seem like he's going anywhere.

Apparently Liverpool also made an enquiry about Zakaria before finally deciding to go for Arthur instead. Both probably just as bad. 😂

Looking like it will be a loan.

Feeling pretty indifferent about Zakaria to be honest. Don't think it's a good transfer but not necessarily a bad one either. The panic button has well and truly been pushed but at least it's another body in midfield to cover in case of injuries. And it's only a loan so it's not a huge disaster if he turns out to be about as shite as we expect. He'd have to exceed all expectations for us to buy him on a permanent deal (option at £30M) which I don't think is going to be very likely. Zakaria doesn't seem to be on high wages at Juve either with around £65K/wk before taxes being reported in Italian sources (3M€/y net). Add a couple million as a loan fee and we're probably looking at a total cost around £5M for the whole deal including the loan fee and wages. If he can contribute in any way it will have been a decent deal all-round. And by contributing I mean at the very least offering a rotational option to start in the cup games and the occasional PL appearance, so basically like Saul last year. Saul's loan was a lot more expensive so therefore a much worse deal.

No he doesn't. He was at some point rumored to be in talks for an extension that would have included a future release clause but he never signed it.