The only place to be

Reassuring to see us continuing our previous policy of looking at young, promising, cheaper talent. Haven't seen a huge amount of him but he seems a very tidy player, and his large frame and posture is reminiscent of Ballack in some ways. You don't become a well-regarded youngster in Holland without having something about you and hopefully he provides a bit of what we're missing in the pivot/midfield. Good luck Marco.

Rooney doesn't look like that at all. Torres's issues arose from physical injuries which robbed him of his most potent threat - his pace. Rooney hasn't lost anything except a bit of motivation in my opinion. Him under Mourinho is something exciting.

Washed up at 27? 12 goals and 10 assists in a similar role to Juan Mata (and in fewer games)....what does that say about Mata?

A random one - the girl who played Nigel's daughter on EastEnders used to sit with her old man in the Shed in the late-90s. She grew up into this Used to get a few of the actors off The Bill wandering around the dugouts when the players were warming up too. Can't really be bothered to google their names though.

Great to have him back in this capacity. He was a massive part of what was one of the greatest nights in Chelsea history and put two away against Barcelona right in front of me. Legend. http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xq6a40_chelsea-vs-fc-barcelona-3-1-5-4-2000_sport#.UdPjRD6Y7zU Remember when we signed him for about £300k too and he had his debut at somewhere like Coventry I think. Managed to score too if I remember correctly, heading the ball back across goal.

Agree with all of this. He needs the right motivation (a bit like Drogba at times) but on his day he is one of the most destructive players in the world. In terms of his fit, I love the idea of him leading the line but also having the ability to drop off and bring players like Mata, Hazard and Schurrle into the game. He's a big game player in my opinion and he can also play in the hole which would enable us to use Lukaku up top without losing Rooney's threat. He knows this league, he's scored in a Champions League Final and the prospect of him working with Mourinho is very exciting indeed.

I love Mata and I think he's an excellent representative of Chelsea Football Club, but I'm really starting to think that he won't have another season like he did last time out in terms of importance to the team, minutes and goals/assists. I really do think he might sit out a few matches where Oscar's workrate might be considered more important, because Mata can sometimes struggle to impose himself on the opposition. I actually think that Oscar has a higher ceiling than Mata and that Jose might choose to give him the Number 10 role instead of Juan, which is probably why there's been these stories leaking out. This isn't a case of 'Jose likes to bully the opposition' but Mata always gives the impression of being knackered and sometimes the distances between him and the other midfielders makes passing the ball out of defence tricky, and also creates holes for the opposition to exploit. Maybe that's a case of his stupidly heavy workload over the last 24 months and maybe Jose can work on some of these issues but I do think that Mata might become slightly less important to our team next season.

I'm not going to defend the haters, because there are no haters. Not a single Chelsea supporter will have been surprised at his ability to make that clearance. In fact nothing he does surprises me anymore because he is that gifted a player. The issue some people have (and I've echoed this sentiment before) is his focus in certain matches. He is a big-game player in the truest sense of the word, but occasionally he can wander off in games that he might not think are that important. That is almost certainly something that will come with age and I imagine Jose will focus on this aspect of his game too, but I think this is the reason why some people still have a question mark over him. Instances like the mistake in the last game at home to Everton or bodychecking a player when the game is over at home to Brentford just give some people cause for thought. But I am starting to think that based on his improvements in his game in recent years (simple stuff like putting the ball into the stands rather than trying to play it out when it's unwise too) that he could well become one of the top CBs around.

Good loan from the club's point of view. Gets him off the wage bill and can really only do his value good because he's got to be virtually worthless in the transfer market at this point in time. I've said it before but his career here was pretty much fucked when we won the CL, qualified for last season's competition and then were able to bring in Hazard. Not the biggest waste of money, but simply became a pointless transfer when things went our way. Good luck to him though.

Doesn't their fixture list start 14 days before our's?

Here's the funny thing - if that was at Chelsea then you'd expect someone like JT or Lamps to take him to one side and have a quiet word, yet there's talk of him being captain. It's one thing to have passion and fire (and he has that in spades, which is why we love him) but you've got to be smart. Players like Riccy had that nastiness in them, but they were sly little fuckers at the same time.

I don't think his 'detractors' think he is rubbish. In fact I think everyone knows just how good David Luiz can be. But I think his critics and his supporters will both be united in a sense of 'well, that's David'. He can be absolutely phenomenal but if he does something so mind-numbingly stupid as horsecollaring a player in the box, no-one is going to be that surprised. Someone said elsewhere that he makes tackles others don't, and I think that's true. He will close down players and win the ball when other defenders simply wouldn't have the foresight or pace to do so. What attackers hate about him is what his supporters and teammates must also be slightly wary of - unpredictability.

Can't he have 12?

Really looking forward to seeing him in action and hopefully he can shake this silly link to De Bruyne off. It was tiresome when the deal was being made and talk about squad numbers is pointless (although I'd love KDB to get the 12 shirt). He offers options and depth, two things we lacked last season and he seems to be a decent guy too which is an overlooked attribute sometimes.

Before knowing how well he performs in this league? Still fucking ridiculous.

He was a Chelsea player. No. We made Cech the best in the world, and we made Terry the best in the world, and we made Lamps the best in the world, and we'll make Hazard the best in the world. Buying the 'best player in the world' (which it's debatable if he is - if we were strongly linked with Falcao or Lewandowski then I think they'd magically become better) is expensive and not a long-term policy. What's far more exciting is watching players develop over time. But I'm looking forward to seeing Cavani come off the bench and giving Lukaku a rest.

Off the top of my head.... Shevchenko Casiraghi Crespo Mutu Weah

I think we have to be fair to RVP and look at each injury he suffered - they weren't considered problem injuries, or ones likely to recur. What RVP did have was a good recent record in the Premier League, something Cavani doesn't. In fact outside of Napoli (Palermo and Uruguay) his record is fairly average, but there are other factors that are associated with that. Saying we'll get the better bargain before you know the price or how he'll handle this league is fucking ridiculous though, isn't it?

The positive way to look at this is that Cavani will be a great option to bring off the bench when Lukaku is done destroying teams for the first 65 minutes. Actually that's my take on this - he's an upgrade on Torres. Now I'm excited by this move.

Absolutely it makes more sense if Torres leaves, hopefully as part of this deal. I think that last part of your point is key though. I think we win the league next season whether we get Cavani or not. I think we're a good team with an excellent coach and that we'll be stronger in the areas in which we under-performed simply by virtue of having a coach come in who has a pre-season to work with the squad and is a fantastic tactician (unlike Robbie who quite simply isn't). Cavani to me is just another short-cut to success though in my opinion. Sticking with someone like Lukaku will be bumpier but I think it establishes a new personality at this club where people are given a chance if they deserve one (and he does) and the other youngsters at this club will see that and repeat that process. Look, I'm prepared to accept him if he comes in works hard and helps us win stuff, and I fully accept that Lukaku will still get his chances but to me this move runs contrary to what we've been building intelligently for the last two years. In my view we were doing an amazing job and Jose was the final step in that process, but now we're stuttering and panicking and reaching for the most expensive salve in the store.

That last sentence sounds a lot like Peter Kenyon in 2005. Personally I agree with what you're saying which is why this deal surprises me. For the millionth fucking time, people don't seem to understand what Arsenal did. They didn't just rely on youth, they underinvested in their first team and spent poorly on journeyman 27 year olds who simply weren't good enough. That last part is something I completely disagree with. The striking position wasn't the issue for us, but our ability to control games in the centre of the back and have a reliable platform on defence from which to build. The fact that you suggest sacrificing the midfield to get a striker is worth considering is utterly dumbfounding. I'm all for players having competition, but Lukaku isn't fighting against Cavani - he's going to be up against a £50 million price tag that has to be given every chance to succeed because of the giant financial commitment we will have made. Maybe Mourinho will be fearless in dropping him to the bench if he underperforms, but how will the board react to that? At best it's a mild conflict. Damn....we should have appointed Kevin Keegan instead of Mourinho. Man United last season were a pretty poor team. They won the league but they failed to build a team strong enough to compete in Europe and if you ask their supporters they'll point to their lack of a midfield figure as the key. It's why they are so keen to get Thiago. Also, RVP was being chased by about 3-4 top teams both here and abroad and was a fantastic deal at more than half the price we're looking to spend on Cavani.

Last season our marquee signing was Eden Hazard, a player very much on the up who filled a spot in which we had no other options and who had re-sale value which was roughly 60-70% what we paid for him. He was also being chased by the three biggest clubs in this country. This season we're going for a player who is at his peak (according to numerous posters in this thread) who immediately jumps in front of another player who was looking for his chance, who has re-sale value of roughly half his fee if it doesn't work out (at best) and we're the only team willing to pay what Napoli would find acceptable if reports are to be believed. This isn't a continuation of what we've been doing since June 2011, but us reverting to January 2011.

You can't just say something is a ridiculous argument without pointing out why - in fact just highlight certain points and allow people to find ridicule in them themselves. You're really doing this all backwards. And the club has shown a rather unusual commitment to FFP so having a £50 million item on the books (or an amortised item equating to roughly £10 millon per year for five years at a guess) does actually stop us from spending money in other areas. Now the possible upside is that Jose thinks that we have the tools in-house to fix these issues and sees the likes of Nat Chalobah and even possibly RLC as being ready for the first-team. That would actually be a positive step forwards for the club and continue the new thinking we've had over the last few years.

Stop buying Choulo's bullshit. I've got nothing against a fan simply based on where they're from. In fact I have a lot of great discussions with fans from around the world and if anything my last comment was about some of the fairweather fans who go to Stamford Bridge. So maybe read my posts before taking offence at them. Lukaku and De Bruyne won't solve our problems because our problems weren't in those positions. We lost games because we gave away cheap goals, and that was down to the defence, the pivot and general coaching issues. We didn't lose against QPR, Southampton and West Brom primarily because of a lack of goals - we lost because we bottled matches towards the end and couldn't control the game from midfield. £50 million could've been used to strengthen the base of the team and give us a solid foundation to build on. Right now we're sticking a fancy roof on a house built on shaky foundations. I have no problem with us spending money to improve our playing staff, but I think there has to be logic and order to it. That's something we've excelled at in the last couple of years, making bigger stars out of players like Hazard, Mata and even role players like Azpi. That's what a lot of us have enjoyed seeing. Yes the club is a business, but it's also about the people and a lot of the supporters were looking forward to us finally taking a chance on young players like Lukaku who feel like one of us, part of the family. It would've been a brave choice to take this young man who had a remarkable season and look to him to help build our future, but instead we've gone for the 'old Chelsea' move of throwing money at the most expensive striker available. Maybe it's a great business move, but it's not one that excites me.

So if Lukaku is unable to get us to that level, why don't we sell him and re-invest in another young striker who can get us to that level? My personal opinion is that NO STRIKER will get us to some mythological next level and what we actually need to do is focus on the midfield and defence which is what made us the best team in England in 2005-2006. In fact we stuck with Drogba when he wasn't the beast he is now and that ultimately took us to the Champions League Final twice. But of course that makes me a Lukaku fanboy. Maybe I'm just a fan of players who have a tremendous work ethic and love this club as much as some of the people on here.