Jype

For Torres they might not really have a choice but to accept less money because his contract is up in 2021. If their financial situation is as dire as rumored, they surely won't let one of their most valuable players leave on a free.

So if they're open to having part of the fee tied to bonuses then around £70+20M should do the trick. I don't think that's at all unreasonable for a 21yo attacking midfielder who despite his young age already has two consecutive seasons of around 20 goals across all competitions. And let's not forget goals and assists aren't the only thing he provides, his all around play is pretty good too and he still has potential for a big improvement. His positional and tactical versatility is also really unique, especially for such a young player. If the bonuses/add-ons include stuff like the club winning titles (PL / CL). as well as some personal benchmarks like goals or even winning the Ballon d'Or then I'd say it's money extremely well spent if the clauses are ever reached.

Wasn't it Liverpool who ended our run? It's only fair to return the favor.

Most likely yeah. But their players don't really seem up for the challenge anymore, only 3 wins out of 7 after the break. Remains to be seen what their motivation level going into next week is (home record, lifting the trophy after the game) but they're not unbeatable by any means.

Sheffield Utd overtaking Chelsea needs some real high level mental gymnastics. It's not happening, their chance is at best a theoretical one. Could really use Arsenal beating the dippers in the coming match. That way they wouldn't be chasing a PL point record anymore so they might not take it so seriously next week. Still unbeaten at home for the last 60 home games in the league or something, so there's that.

Most likely the latter. If Havertz fails I could maybe see the club going for Benrahma and trying Ziyech through the middle. Milinkovic-Savic could be an interesting alternative for Havertz. While they're not the exact same type of player, they do have certain similarities. He's even been linked with Chelsea this summer, although reports have been from low-tier sources.

Yeah, I remember that too. For a keeper it's very dangerous if his head is not in the game. Breaking up with his girl might have affected him for a while, but as time went on and his performances hit rock bottom it takes miracles to recover the confidence. But either way, I've never really considered Kepa a top keeper. He was doing okay last season but even then he never showed any world class potential.

Only way the club are paying £90M for Oblak is if Atletico take part-exchange with Kepa valued 50M or higher.

Starting to look a tiny bit better. Need a goal before HT.

Yep, the BBC article says pretty much exactly what I wrote a few pages back. For a young player it should be all about the club's ambition, their long-term vision and of course getting a nice big salary is welcomed too. Havertz can have all of that at Chelsea if he joins. Obviously an immediate trophy contender (Bayern, Real Madrid) can offer the same too with the added bonus of more chances of short-term success but as a downside the pressure is higher at those clubs too, not to mention there are better players competing for the same positions so there's also a higher chance of his development stalling if he doesn't hit it off immediately. But that's something for him to consider before making his move, if he's happy with Chelsea's project and the club can agree a deal with Leverkusen I'm sure he'd want to join with or without CL because those two clubs don't seem to be after him for a 2020 move. Werner was more than willing to join Lampard's project so why wouldn't his pal Havertz want to do the same?

Well, some of the transfer window experts have said there can be more swap deals in the coming window due to clubs not being in a position where they can spend a lot of money. We've already seen that happen with Arthur and Pjanic. So we only need Atletico's board to be crazy enough to take Kepa at a decent value and Oblak himself willing to agree to a move that he specifically refused just two years ago, easy peasy. But can't really see it happening.

Well that's that then, 2-1. United are annoyingly good at the moment.

Keeper really should have saved that, beaten at the near corner.

Southampton lead! Looks like we're due a Man Utd penalty now.

How many penalties for United today? I'm gonna go with two. Jokes aside, let's hope fatigue comes into play at some point in the remaining games for United. They've named an unchanged starting lineup for five league games in a row. I've pretty much given up hope of them crashing out of top4 but could really use them dropping points in at least some of their remaining fixtures to keep them motivated for their last game against Leicester who've become our main rivals for fourth place. Last thing I'd like to see is United securing third place before last GW and then rolling over against Leicester.

Not a problem for next season because AFCON21 was delayed until 2022. And I believe the next African championships after that are scheduled for June-July so it's not going to affect clubs anymore in the future. Losing him for a few games in the season after next can't seriously be considered a factor when deciding whether to get Onana or not.

Off the field issues are something the clubs care about a lot. First of all clubs don't want the bad press but more importantly off the field stuff can easily affect their performances too, so it's better to have a player who's a model professional than someone who's more reckless and you never know what they're gonna get themselves involved with next. I believe I'm right when I say that a huge part of scouting is finding out what kind of person a player is off the pitch and what their mentality is like. Someone like Jovic hasn't exactly presented himself in a good light lately. And just need to look at our own squad right now, more importantly Kepa. There's been rumors he had a bad break-up from his girlfriend sometime last year and that's said to have affected his training and performances a lot. So aside from his skills (or lack thereof) maybe the club didn't do a very good job with scouting his fragile mentality etc. before spending a huge amount of money on him? Same for Morata before.

Could be a problem with squad balance too. Tammy started almost every game in the first half of the season (Giroud started one league match while Batshuayi played the EFL Cup games) and once he got injured he never really recovered his form. That's partly on Lampard too because he failed to utilize Giroud early on. I'd say Mount suffered from being overplayed too, his form also turned bad around the same time as Abraham having played pretty much every minute of the season. For Mount the 3 month break came at a good time because it allowed him to finally get some rest and he's looked more like himself again after the hiatus but Tammy's form hasn't been the same. If we look at Costa and Morata, they also didn't have reliable backups and had to play every game when fit. Remy was a good rotation option for Costa but he was always injured so Diego never got any rest and Michy was/is... Well we all know the answer to that.

Tammy hasn't been good in 2020 but some of the reactions here are way over the top. He's shown more than enough this season to warrant another chance, even if it's not as first choice anymore due to Werner's arrival. In fact, I'd even go as far as to say not many teams have a second choice striker as good as Abraham. I'll give you City with Jesus but after that not really. Sure United can play Greenwood up front if Martial gets sidelined but that leaves their RW lacking, same for Spurs at LW if they have to play Son as a striker. Liverpool have Origi as their backup and he's not even better than Batshuayi. Tammy's still young enough to learn and improve so I wouldn't give up on him just yet. It's true he has got the basics wrong many times lately but it's his first season as an actual Chelsea player and not just another name in the loan army so just like every other youngster in the squad I'm ready to give him the benefit of the doubt. Getting a top striker like Werner is crucial because it takes pressure off Abraham too. That being said, I wouldn't give him a big contract just yet. He's still got three years of his current deal left if the rumors of the automatic one year extension are true, so the club should monitor his development next season and make him earn that contract on the pitch. If by the end of next season he hasn't shown any improvement he can still be sold for a decent amount of money later.

Yep, I think Dembele was always a target of the board / scouting department but Lampard never really fancied him. He'd have taken him as a January signing if available but Lyon refused to sell mid-season and for the summer window Lampard never even considered him. Looking at some of the rumored targets (Mertens, Aubameyang and then finally landing Werner) it's clear Lampard wanted someone more versatile who can play different positions or roles across the front line, instead of Dembele who can only play up front as a sole striker. I believe his versatility is one of the main reasons Lampard wants Havertz so much too.

Can already see this scenario playing out: Man Utd win against So'ton, Palace and West Ham -> 67pts before GW38. Leicester win against Sheffield Utd and Spurs -> 65pts before GW38. Chelsea win against Norwich but lose to Liverpool -> 63pts before GW38. Then Man Utd either roll over with a youth squad in the last game or they play a boring 0-0 draw with Leicester that guarantees them both in the CL.

Like I said there are exceptions but many top players have moved to clubs without CL football on offer. And while Hazard had many options to choose from, it looks like for Havertz there may not be many other suitors for a 2020 move. Of course he can wait a year and then have his pick of clubs but does he want to stay at Leverkusen another season? But either way, guaranteeing CL footy is crucial whether it's the money or pulling power we're talking about.

No, it means a club that can offer him a massive wage rise and a better platform for future success. I don't think many players care about not being in the CL in the short term. United signed Pogba, Di Maria etc. all without CL football while we got N'Golo Kante in 2016 after a disastrous season. Could be some exceptions to this of course, but as a basic rule I'd say there just needs to be a clear direction the club is heading to attract good talent. That being said, I don't think we'd get Havertz without CL football but that's coming mostly from a financial standpoint rather than Kai himself backing out.

Bakayoko was definitely a Conte target. However, Conte wanted to keep Matic too in order to ease Bakayoko into the squad but ended up having to accelerate his introduction because the club sold Matic which Conte didn't like. For RWB he wanted Oxlade-Chamberlain and the club even agreed a fee with Arsenal but the player decided to go to Liverpool instead, so not much to do there. Getting Zappacosta as plan B was probably Conte's idea, having managed him before at Italy NT. For the striker spot he wanted Lukaku (which is even more obvious now given he signed him at Inter) but ended up with Morata. Could be one of many reasons behind this 'failure'. Maybe Marina was just penny pinching and thought there was no rush to pay Everton's asking price with no other contenders for the signing before United came out of the blue and finished it in record time. Or maybe Lukaku & Raiola just preferred the contract offer from United. Drinkwater was no doubt a board signing and a total fuck up. And the club failed to back Conte with Alex Sandro signing, which was probably because Alonso had played so well in the title winning season at wing-back and the club were reluctant to spend so much money on another wing-back so soon.

Only started 16 games too, with 5 additional appearances off the bench. All this amounts to a goal or assist every 140 minutes or so and that's not even counting the penalties / dangerous free kicks he's earned that have resulted in goals. If he can stay fit next season, I wouldn't rule out Pulisic scoring ~15 goals in the league.