Chelsea Legend 11

I'm hearing its £20m.

Lets be honest with ourselves here, Schneiderlin is not coming to Chelsea. He will be competing with Matic for playing time and will definitely not best Nemanja for that starting role. He walks in City, Arsenal or Utd and starts pretty much every game.

We don't live in a dream world where the top strikers have no trouble with sitting on the bench where other top players play match after match. Falcao is not done, he is still recovering from injury. Most often when you have an injury like that it takes a year and a half to fully recover... that's what the doctors say anyways. If we sign him on loan or for a nominal fee and he's not on ridiculous wages we could have the coup of the decade on our hands. I like the fact he allegedly wants to be at Chelsea for a pay cut and also that he is proven at the top level. My preference is without a doubt for Benteke but I don't know if he fancies coming here to fight for a shirt. If he goes to Utd he walks right into their XI and into the champions league.

20m is a lot for a fullback, its rare you see a return on that sort of money.

£20m he's twenty. Does he have the sort of potential that will see his value increase in a few years?

http://metro.co.uk/2015/05/22/manchester-united-and-chelsea-target-nico-gaitan-on-cusp-of-premier-league-transfer-5211324/ Looks like this is heating up a bit. I don't mind Gaitan actually as a squad guy we can definitely do worse.

So apparently Chelsea are looking at this guy who had a breakthrough season at Augsburg. Looks pretty decent but I don't know much about him, any avid Bundesliga fans out there? He had a great season and is only 20. He's a two-footed LB from Ghana and played 31 games for Augsburg. 3.5 tackles per game 2.7 interceptions 2.8 clearances 4 assists 1.4 dribbles 68% pass completion On paper he looks like a Jose type player. He's fast and looks like he wins a high percentage of tackles (54%) The types of player that would compliment our high press quite nicely. Anyone know anything about him?

Oh so when you're trapped with the truth the stats mean nothing? I get it. Lol.

Not at all I look at ALL the seasons not just the exception to the rule. He's been awful this year and mediocre for most his career.

I did he played out of position and was pretty decent. I also watched him many seasons before that where he was extremely average. Why focus on the one season where he played out of position and make it sound like that is how he always plays? They moved him there so he could get into the team not because he was amazing his whole career look at his career numbers.

Goalscoring. Pace. Technical ability Dribbling Very strong Long passes Through balls Contributes defensively Good in the air Fouls a lot Doesn't play the game at a high tempo Not very consistent Upright, doesn't look to have the best balance Not the best at recycling possession, gives it away a bit.

Your vision of Koke is he is a tempo guy who can play off of Cesc, I'm not so sure he can dictate tempo and DEFINITELY not anywhere near the level of Cesc. He's a cog in the engine but he doesn't make his team go. I think what you want is another playmaker, Koke is good in that role but not exceptional. As a matter of fact the only part of his game I think is excpetional is his work rate. I watched Pogba today against Napoli, you could tell they were paying close attention to him he never really got too many opportunities to turn and face the goal with the ball. They pressed him all game. What I did notice in that game is how beautiful a player Marchisio is! He controlled the tempo well and was afforded more space because of the marking of Pogba.

Doesn't do it for me. Works in some situations not ours.

Wouldn't be a bad foil to Cesc and Oscar though, seems pretty tidy and is a left footer who can deliver decent set pieces... For the rumoured price we can definitely do worse.

No I've never seen him play before. Explain to me what I'm missing For his career he averages 1.1 tackle and 0.8 interceptions Working hard for me means tracking back and covering for teammates, not exactly the hallmark for Angel. For his career he averages 1.6 dribbles a game which is pretty much average for a AM His career he averages two key passes a game which is a bit skewed since he is usually on set piece duty(Corners where a scoring chance is generated counts as a key pass) But with that said I guess you can say he is decent in the chance creation department. He averages a goal every 5 games again not anything close to scintillating... So what am I missing since you seem to watch him more than me.

What does he do well that will help us? Does he win possession? Nope. Does he work hard for the team? Nope. Does he beat men off the dribble? Nope. Does he score goals? Nope. Does he possess the ability to create scoring opportunities with a key pass? Somewhat... but mostly with diagonal crosses to the back post. So how would we use him? Like Bale? Bale scores goals DiMaria runs fast and out of control.

Neither am I.

Has anyone watched Di Maria this season? He's been a flop of Torresian proportions! Why are people all up on him now? I don't want to bail out Utd at all... If we're looking to get one of their players for Cech let it be Phil Jones... Versatile, English, decent.

Glad I'm not the only one who sees this. I think a lot of people theorize on what Koke is without looking at the hard evidence. He's become a hot name but he's still only a decent player, not the guy who will put us in that upper echelon.

Ya we're clearly at an impasse. What you see in Koke I only sort of see... He hasn't really shown that he can dictate the tempo, Atletico play primarily on the counter attack and surrender possession to the opposition. They don't even really recycle the possession well because they play so direct and like to get it into the channels. What makes you think dictate the tempo? he attempts 52 passes a game on average and completes them less than 80% of the time. If you want a guy who dictates tempo you are better off with someone like Verratti, Gundogan, Biglia, Pjanic, Kroos, Rakitic. The one area I would say Koke is superior is work rate, he has a tireless engine and runs a lot of miles each game. He works hard. What you call balance I call meh... Koke has better vision than Ramires but has less goals. He can open up teams with cleverness I guess but he completes passes at a similar rate to Ramires(Ramires is actually better) In Pogba you get an elite athlete you can mould into anything you want him to be, that's why he's gonna cost more than 60m because he is a player who hasn't even scratched the surface of his potential and is already one of the best midfielders in the world. Imagine what Jose can do with a player like that for a second? Its scary... You have limited upside with Koke and limitless upside with Pogba.

This is one of the best things I've seen you write. I now understand why you prefer Koke to Pogba. I want a classic Jose Mourinho midfield with pace, power and goals. Pogba, Matic and Cesc would without question boss the midfield! That to me is a much more balanced midfield than Koke, Cesc and Matic. Option one we have everything option 2 we are lacking. And while Pogba is far from a guy you can rely on setting tempo, he is without question closer to being the most complete midfielder in the game than Koke. He can pretty much play any style any formation and not look out of place.

Signing Pogba won't come down to money. It will come down to where he wants to be... All the teams involved know what the price is and are willing to pay, what's left is where he wants to go. And the inflation on his price is getting ridiculously out of control. He won't be sold £75m... Btw I love Ruben, I think he's gonna be a special player what I don't get is how you can say yes to Koke and no to Pogba but then say you want Ruben to come into the squad. Does Koke play striker or something?

Really? So you'd think his advisors are gonna tell him to go to Real and be managed by Rafa? You think his agent is gonna risk injury and wait till the transfer embargo on Barca is lifted? To both questions I say HELL NO. We have a great situation here and a great coach, the Prem is the most watched league in the world don't sell us short just yet.

It got settled in the court of appeals, they don't owe us that money anymore.

Definitely bored... Its 4:30 over here. Waiting for the night life to kick in. Anyways thanks for the little entertainment you've provided! You're always good for a decent chuckle