BlueLyon

Going by how we are selling certain players to rivals just to get more money, I wouldnt be surprised it was chelsea who wanted to sell costa to china for 80m... Obviously conte and costa might had personal bust up which led to chelsea wanting to sell costa, but to say costa wanted to leave chelsea for china is unfair to diego aswell. Diego said he would never join china because he wants to stay competitive for wc.

With Baka-Kante midfield, we will need two attacking FBs. Rudiger is ok as backup there, but I wouldnt put him as starter. I cheer for Sandro and Aurier, but it will be tough.

Would be amazing signing, for that price even more.

He and Cyprien are both brilliant. Shame Cyprien got injured back then, I would actualy love him here as backup option. Or Naby Keita, but seems Leipzig doesnt want to sell...

2 years? He is italian, he is not even in his prime yet

It depends on what you get for money you pay. No one here can buy Sandro or whoever because no one has that amount of money, so the thread is pointless. But if I give lets say 100e would that mean Sandro is definately coming here? And if I dont, he wont come here? Its desire, just as someone wants shoes for 100, some would love to have Sandro here. And much like I pay 100e for shoes and get them, I would pay 100e if that meant Sandro comes here.

Yes but at same time our bench looks poor as feck, because we cant get proper replacement in mould of Matic that would "care" for club and accept bench role. Sure now we have 40m in our pocket, but that wont help us with our title defense if we dont spend it properly. If we invest that money in young talent, they will be loaded to vitesse, if we get lets say Drinkwater or someone similar for 40m, hell thats money poorly spent and Matic shouldnt be sold. THE ONLY positive I see in Matic sale is if we spend money on someone quality ala Verratti, Matuidi, Vidal, Tolisso,... (if they were available; but since they are not whats the point in selling Matic if we cant get better player than him then)

We have too much respect for players in that case. We could have easily kept Matic who has been here for quite some time, won stuff and is proven player. But instead, as soon he wasnt exactly first option and hoped to leave, we sell him wherever he wants to go, even to our rival like United. We did same with Mata. We couldnt keep them even for single season. Then you see Utd holding on Martial, Bayern on Muller,...even though their role decreased in last season. Now it will be very hard to get player like Matic who will be experienced, proven and happy to sit on bench. Now Im not sure if thats just our policy with players or they simply dont want to stay here unless they have good role. But at least on paper they should, we have been more successful than United or City, yet good players always prefer to sit on their bench than ours... With two new fullbacks hopefuly, imagine we could have Cech, Rudiger, Alonso, Moses, Matic, Cesc, Mata, Willian and Bats on bench. Instead we have very thin bench with few game changers...

The only problem I see with us buying Drinkwater is his reported fee and the fact Matic was still better player. We got 40m in bank from Matic and 70m from Oscar, Im sure we can get proper replacement that will be happy enough to understand he will compete for starting spot. Straight out of my head, Sanson would be allright alternative. And there are plenty more players that we can try to get with that money. Drinkwater is not better option to have than Matic. In that case we should simply keep Matic. If he wanted to leave? So? Martial lost his place too and he wasnt sold to Chelsea straight after. We will play 2 man midfield and only Kante seems to be nailed on starter. Cesc is better as alternative, never a starter and Bakayoko needs to recover first, gain fitness and then prove his spot. That said, I just hope we get two proper wingbacks, those two are crucial improvements right now.

IMO far more valuable player than at first sight. But for that money at this age and he is clearly declining...probably good business. However we need to spend that money now on quality experienced midfielder, because we realy need one.

Aurier is available for 25m. He is bit of loose cannon, but I think he would be amazing signing, for that price even more.

Perfect example of neighbour grass is greener... Shit season, plays position we dont have formation for, overpriced and overrated. The only reason we do that is to get english player in squad/bench, but for 40m thats ridiculous.

50m in the bank from Matic, lets buy Vidal then...Sanches is another talent with who needs alot of patience, trust and playtime. Wont get that at Chelsea.

50m is great and all, but unless we actualy buy another high quality midfielder, whats the point? We will strenghten United and at same time lose valuable player. 50m in the bank means shit if we dont improve our team.

Take Costa's mentality aside, he was one of worlds best players before january and even after january he helped with some crucial moments (but indeed was poor overall). We had two world class attackers in Eden and Costa. With Morata (and Bats) we improved character of our strikers, but not quality. Some of you need to realise Costa was believe it or not world class striker overall last season and even tho I like Morata alot, we are weaker team ATM. I do believe Michy and Morata will come good, but I doubt they will have same killer impact as Costa did (or Didi)

In dabbing, thats for sure

We should either play different formations, players etc...or work hard with first 11 to improve our main 11. Seems we arent doing either. Or at least we could try to gel in our new signings, but shame Rudiger and Baka are injured...

U neee luck obviously but we were realy competitive and in top4 2007-2010. Thats why we were very high in pl and cl those years. Consistency. After that we might win CL in 2012 but that was big one off because we finished 6th in league that year and our Cl record since is not realy impressive anymore like it was pre 2010.

Kind of stupid from him to talk about Kane so highly after signing Morata week earlier.

I guess Bats realy impressed Conte this pre season and that is a great thing. We will see both Bats and Morata feature quite heavily but Im sure sooner or later Morata will be the main man once he settles in.

No. Real lost to city 4:1... These preseason friendlies mean zero. Even more so when we dont have our best player on pitch and Baka still out

Then we are idiots..buying someone who prefers money instead of developing weekly... Unless we move to 3 man midfield, I dont see how would Sanches get proper spot and playtime here anyway.

Not that i want spuds getting new players but wtf are they doing this window lol? Sold Walker and didnt improve their team one bit...

Why not just give Baker that role? Barkley was average past year and if Baker cant properly fill that role as backup AM, then we might as well sell him. Baker had good season albeit in holland, but still he deserves a chance.

Been saying this for ages to me Sandro looks like done deal for at least one month