Reddish-Blue

He's also not in the squad because he's more of an attacking mid than a central midfield player.

Massive game to see mentality of the players, at home, vs another top 6-8 PL side.

Brighton are generally well drilled, I wouldn't expect that much control in midfield. Prediction is a 2-2 draw or we somehow sneak a win at home against them.

He would probably do better in the Italian league. I thought Inter recently signed another defender

Some decent fixtures: Tottenham v City Brighton v Liverpool Wimbledon/Newcastle vs us

I think that type of model only works once all the high earners are sold off. Essentially, you would be like Brighton in the premier league, good enough to be competing for a top 8 spot and capable of playing good games against the top sides of the EPL.

I'm still surprised that Arsenal didn't get this guy.

It is an improvement from previous windows when they went for Fofana, Mudryk for 70 million each. If we can offload Disasi/Badiashile and get a proper CB/RB, that would be amazing.

Wasn't that the Mourinho era, think we had a run of like 80 games or so where teams couldn't beat us at the Bridge!

He seems to be a better ball striker than Jackson, that's for sure!

Didn't UEFA also stop the Todibo transfer to United as Ratcliffe had a controlling in both clubs and they were both in European competitions this season. Actually sounds like a good thing as the club will be punished for wasting ridiculous money on players that weren't worth it (Mudryk, Fofana, Cucurella, Enzo, Caicedo).

Brighton won't be any easier with the way they've playing under the new manager, and then Forest will be hard as well as they just managed to beat Liverpool at Anfield... I feel like the lack of experience in midfield/defense is going to cost us against all these 'plucky' sides.

If you replaced Gusto with Lavia, that would be true...😆

Not to defend Mount but he was from the academy so he gets a few passes for shite performances. Felix has always been inconsistent, thats why he's been moving clubs every other season.

Mate, you need to link the Drogba video for context 😆

Isn't that what he did at Brighton as well? I'm not sure what fans expect from Caicedo? He's the energy player, gets around the midfield, runs a lot...similar to Kante (but Kante was a cheat code). We should just be glad that we somehow got away with 3 points with a makeshift midfield and Disaster at RB. On to the next game... West Ham, Brighton, Forest....then we basically play the top 6 till 23rd November.

Because there's no controller in the midfield. You go back over the years, it was Makelele, Essien, Obi Mikel, Matic, Kovacic/Kante. Right now, I don't see Enzo or Caicedo being that player, ideally Lavia is supposed to be the one but his injury issues (in such a young career) are concerning. Think we have horrible fixtures coming up so it'll be interesting to see how Maresca adapts.

Exactly. I've seen United, Liverpool and a few other clubs loan out players and they all have penalty clauses for lack of game time. It's just easier to write bad when it comes to Chelsea because we get way more clicks on X and other platforms!

To be fair, Broja hasn't looked like a PL level striker since those injuries wrecked his development. A bit of financial security was definitely helpful in that situation. Funny how he had multiple offers but his agents chose Forest and the Forest manager at the time came out and said something along the lines of we like him as cheap squad depth but he won't be getting minutes. At least it's good to see Santos playing more regularly in France and developing his skills!

I remember when similar things were being said about Loftus-Cheek, shame about his back injuries as he had all the tools to be that x-factor in our midfield.

I never saw him as a player that could "run the show". At best, he was a system player at his previous club and the coach knew how to get him motivated and do the basic things well. I think the other issue with Mudryk (which he spoke about during his time with the national team) is that he was hoping to move to a club with his international team-mates to help him settle down and adapt to the league. That's the reason why the links to Arsenal were so strong and Zinchenko was one of his close friends and then the Chelsea transfer happened and he doesn't have that friendship here. Ideally, he needs a loan to a different league, fresh start, play without the pressure, have fun again and then come back.

I heard reports that he slightly reduced his wage demands for this loan spell, I remember one of the Arsenal reporters saying something like 275k, with Arsenal paying about 125k weekly, Chelsea to cover the rest.

That makes no sense, the youngsters have a pathway as they would be competing against foreign youngsters of a similar age, not experienced 25-28 year old players. Knowing Liverpool he'll go there and in 2-3 years he'll be sold to Bournemouth or some other half decent side for like 20 million just like they did with Solanke and a few others over the years.

With the contract that was given to him, he won't be shipped off anytime soon. 6 years, 250k a week for a player that will end up playing 10-15 games a season if he's fit. Sad part is that talent wise, he's easily up there with the better RB's...

Would have been even better if Broja and Chalobah were sold permanently.