Chelsea banned for TWO transfer windows

[Superblue 6,372]

1 hour ago, the wes said:

Chelsea could be forced to start transfer ban this summer to avoid three-window punishment

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2019/06/05/chelsea-could-forced-start-transfer-ban-summer-fears-will-increased/

Just take the ban on the chin like Anthony Joshua fuck FIFA 

The only worry I have is up front and who is going to replace (and the aim would be to improve on) the goals that Hazard brought to the team. I could cope for a season with every other position (even left back) but that one worries me. Not to forget also that one player who could have shouldered some of the goal scoring burden in RLC is out long term too. We are relying on Giroud who if he played regularly in the league would probably score 10-12 goals in all likelihood - will that be enough? Or we're relying on either Bats or Tammy to come back and blow up which from what I've seen would be unlikely and we'd be hugely fortunate if it did.

On the flip side I don't see an awful lot of options we could go for up front on the market currently. Add to this so many other teams looking to spend big potentially in the market this summer to rebuild and we may be in a better position just to stand our ground and look to rebuild next summer when hopefully less big teams are as active. That's not just up top but in other areas of our team that need addressing also.

 

[Styl1994 188]

1 hour ago, Superblue_1986 said:

The only worry I have is up front and who is going to replace (and the aim would be to improve on) the goals that Hazard brought to the team. I could cope for a season with every other position (even left back) but that one worries me. Not to forget also that one player who could have shouldered some of the goal scoring burden in RLC is out long term too. We are relying on Giroud who if he played regularly in the league would probably score 10-12 goals in all likelihood - will that be enough? Or we're relying on either Bats or Tammy to come back and blow up which from what I've seen would be unlikely and we'd be hugely fortunate if it did.

On the flip side I don't see an awful lot of options we could go for up front on the market currently. Add to this so many other teams looking to spend big potentially in the market this summer to rebuild and we may be in a better position just to stand our ground and look to rebuild next summer when hopefully less big teams are as active. That's not just up top but in other areas of our team that need addressing also.

 

Problem is will the talent be available once everyone has had their pick this summer?

[Superblue 6,372]

21 minutes ago, Styl1994 said:

Problem is will the talent be available once everyone has had their pick this summer?

There's always new players having breakthrough years, continuing their development, etc - hopefully we'll be looking back at this next summer with a couple of our own!

[OhForAGreavsie 6,057]

22 hours ago, Vesper said:

Mentally I LONG ago (months ago) gave up almost all hope for a summer 2019 window, as well as a January 2020 one

This is my problem. I didn't manage to get past denial months ago, and I still haven't if I'm honest. I still cling to the belief that I've had since day one. Namely that there will be no ban.

If you thought I was confused before, imagine what happens when you throw in the Telegraphs's claim that the appeal has gone to CAS minus a suspension request? I could give a long list of speculations and questions about that, but I'll limit myself to just this:-

If not asking CAS for a suspension is tactical then, fine, I can see that. Otherwise, what makes us so confident that we can't do any useful business this summer when several good solutions appear still to be up for grabs?

[Tomo 21,751]

3 hours ago, Superblue_1986 said:

The only worry I have is up front and who is going to replace (and the aim would be to improve on) the goals that Hazard brought to the team. I could cope for a season with every other position (even left back) but that one worries me. Not to forget also that one player who could have shouldered some of the goal scoring burden in RLC is out long term too. We are relying on Giroud who if he played regularly in the league would probably score 10-12 goals in all likelihood - will that be enough? Or we're relying on either Bats or Tammy to come back and blow up which from what I've seen would be unlikely and we'd be hugely fortunate if it did.

On the flip side I don't see an awful lot of options we could go for up front on the market currently. Add to this so many other teams looking to spend big potentially in the market this summer to rebuild and we may be in a better position just to stand our ground and look to rebuild next summer when hopefully less big teams are as active. That's not just up top but in other areas of our team that need addressing also.

 

I do believe all our front players will score more goals with Hazard not around, whether it will be enough over 38 games is an entirely different matter.

I know it's small sample size but if you look at the games we played without Eden these last couple of years in a lot of ways we looked a better unit (so much so I wouldn't have been THATworried about losing him had we been able to replace him). The start of last season under Conte was our best run of form all season and he didn't start in that period and you could argue a lot of our best games of Sarriball (from a collective perspective) came without Hazard playing, Arsenal at home, Burnley away and a chunk of the Europa run admitedly against shit opposition.

The ban and what I alluded to on paragraph one is why I think extending Higuain's loan is a must, despite his so so performances for us he still got us five league goals in as many months, so over a season we should be getting 10 league goals out of him minimum (you would hope more being more use to the PL) which could come very handy. Furthermore if we want to give Pulisic and Hudson significant game time, experience Infront of them is a must.

[ulsterchelsea 3,221]

It's on SPEND SPEND SPEND

[ulsterchelsea 3,221]

Although seemingly whilst appealing the ban we haven't asked for the ban to be frozen so as it stands out send we're still banned from transfers. Shite

[Superblue 6,372]

4 minutes ago, ulsterchelsea said:

Although seemingly whilst appealing the ban we haven't asked for the ban to be frozen so as it stands out send we're still banned from transfers. Shite

Matt Law reported earlier in the week that we don't want to request freezing the ban in case CAS reject the appeals and deem we have only done so to defer the ban. In this case I think there would be fair grounds for them to increase our ban further, hence why the appeal appears more cautious by us.

[Pizy 18,849]

29 minutes ago, ulsterchelsea said:

Although seemingly whilst appealing the ban we haven't asked for the ban to be frozen so as it stands out send we're still banned from transfers. Shite

So what's the fucking point, then!?

The cynic in me says that the club knows there will be outrage if we sell Hazard and then quickly afterwards announce that we are accepting the ban and not signing anyone this summer. They can now say "hey, we tried" and that its out of their hands.

[OhForAGreavsie 6,057]

And the slow drip, drip of information on this case continues.

We can't know definitively whether the Telegraph story about there being no request to delay the implementation of the bans is true. We do know however that none of the earlier reporting has been entirely correct. That suggests there's no reason to put a lot of faith in what the Telegraph said either. It seems Chelsea have played this one close to the chest all the way along.

The upshot is that, for now, we're still free to have fun speculating whatever incoming moves we like. That'll be good because the transfer forum has been deathly quiet for a while. Let the fun recommence. :-) 

UPDATE: it seems CAS has confirmed that we did not (yet )apply for the ban to be suspended. - Well played Telegraph.

 

[the wes 7,212]

 

[Superblue 6,372]

43 minutes ago, Pizy said:

So what's the fucking point, then!?

The cynic in me says that the club knows there will be outrage if we sell Hazard and then quickly afterwards announce that we are accepting the ban and not signing anyone this summer. They can now say "hey, we tried" and that its out of their hands.

It could be exactly for the reasons being speculated - that the club do not want the appeal to be deemed 'frivolous' and be seen simply as a delay procedure for our ban as in that way we may have the ban increased.

I cannot see CAS rejecting the appeal and increasing the ban if we haven't requested the ban to be frozen whilst the appeal is heard as that would be extremely harsh.

I would expect if we are banned from signing players this summer and then the appeal is accepted then we would have significant grounds to sue FIFA for quite a significant amount of money (prize money, potential champions league qualification this coming season, etc) which could well amount to tens of millions. 

At the moment though I agree with @OhForAGreavsie, there simply isn't enough information at the moment out there to know for sure what is going on. As much as we all like to moan, the club have officials within and external law specialists dealing with this case who are far more qualified then all of us and we just have to trust the club that they know what they are doing and are doing the best they can to (1) successfully overturn this, and (2) limit the damage the ban may cause.