Jase

True and it's unlikely to happen but when you factor in the wages that we would be shedding by swapping those 3 players away (Barkley is earning close to 100k p/w, IIRC?), then it's maybe worth it from a financial POV.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2021/07/29/west-ham-target-chelseas-kurt-zouma-sealing-alphonse-areola/ According to the Telegraph, a move for Zouma could happen if West Ham can fork out around £25 million.

The funny thing is West Ham don't really have money and if they want money, they would have to sell players. Good for them if they keep Rice but can their current squad cope with the extra burden of Europa League next season? Don't they still need a striker since Lingard is gone and Antonio is injury prone?

Dortmund CEO Hans-Joachim Watzke on Haaland... https://www.football.london/Chelsea-fc/transfer-news/dortmund-Chelsea-erling-haaland-transfer-21176001 "It is pretty clear to me that Erling Haaland will stay at Dortmund, just as Julian Brandt will remain" Watzke’s told Dortmund’s in-house media channel. "I tend to say that every day but no one really seems to listen as I hear something new every week."

Nope, Zouma isn't considered HG.

Now Sky Sports have this on Zouma...

Similar to the MARCA report shared earlier and the fee that Sevilla supposedly want is closer to what I said the other day. lol

The club need to bite the bullet with Drinkwater. Either loan him out for last time or just ditch him for the lowest price possible and hope Drinkwater is sane enough to accept lower wages elsewhere.

Drinkwater only has a year left on his contract. If we keep him, the club will likely extend his deal by at least another year but that's not ideal given his age and the amount of wages he's on. If we're gonna keep a midfielder as the 4th choice, I'd rather keep someone like Gallagher. He wasn't great on Tuesday but he's still young and can still grow and learn under Tuchel. That being said, I do suspect that we'll end up buying a midfielder.

Barkley has a reputation for doing well in pre-season and then goes AWOL when the actual season begins. Are we sure Drinkwater won't go down that route? There's a reason why Drinkwater has barely played at any of the clubs that he's been loaned to in recent years. Squad player or not, I'd imagine that 4th CM (or whatever people want to term it) will play a decent amount of games throughout the season because we'll have a lot of games again and Jorginho, Kovacic, Kante can't play every game. And not to mention, Kante has a dodgy injury record in recent years. I know Drinkwater won the Premier League but that was 5-6 years ago and it was just one great season. He didn't kick on with his career and instead, let it go downhill. Are we sure he's still up to standards in the Premier League? Or in the Champions League?

Lukaku stories surfacing again in the Italian media...

Abramovich was not ‘directed’ to buy Chelsea FC by Putin, court hears

https://www.marca.com/futbol/villarreal/2021/07/28/61019d5946163f75898b462f.html According to Marca, Gerard Moreno has returned early from vacation to prepare for the upcoming Super Cup game. Only Pau Torres is missing for Villarreal now (he's at the Olympics)

https://www.marca.com/futbol/sevilla/2021/07/28/6100fef5ca4741c2708b45c8.html Marca claimed that Sevilla don't want to go below €70 million for Kounde, despite his €80 million release clause. Sevilla want at least the amount offered to be €50 million if a player is included. Zouma is an old desire of Monchi and Sevilla. It's not mentioned in the article but apparently Kounde also has a 20% sell-on clause on his contract when Sevilla bought him from Bordeaux.

Better than the home kit abomination.

Kounde reportedly already held talks with Tuchel.

Confirmed.

But it was against a Championship team in pre-season? Can we suddenly trust Drinkwater to not cause any off-the-pitch issues after all his recent problems? Can we trust him to be consistent all season long?

Jokes aside, if you have read my stuff, you would have seen that I had replied to that Jype post last night in normal fashion. No GIFs, just plain text. Also, I'm amused that you were/are annoyed with GIFs in replies. Yes, I am aware that the forum is a place where people debate their opinions but it's also the internet! Why be serious all the time?

Not saying whether he's worth the money or not. All I'm saying there's a difference between spending 70m and 150m+ on someone. Spending around 70m on a player has never been a problem for us but spending 150m+ on someone is a new territory for the club. If we could afford the 150m+ outright, one would imagine we would have put in a bid by now but if reports are to be believed, we haven't done that. So, you do wonder whether we actually need to sell the deadwoods to help fund the deal (our summer spending last year was funded by the sales of Hazard and Morata for example). As Jype mentioned, we haven't been able to sell the deadwoods yet and time seems to be running out to put in a bid for Haaland.

Yeah and I'm not saying that we can't do it but it's still a huge difference in the transfer fee. Spending around 70m for someone is never a problem for us but we've never spent more than 100m or even close to it on a player.

Are we arguing about Kepa's capability or the difference in transfer fee here?