Chelsea Transfers

[OneMoSalah 8,886]

40 minutes ago, Pizy said:

I just wonder if Henderson is actually the real deal or if he's just made to look good due to Chris Wilder's defensive setup in front of him. Pickford and Joe Hart were the last English keepers to get hyped to hell and back and they both turned out to be shit. Wonder if Henderson will fare better.

I still think without the mistakes of the last 2 seasons, De Gea would be a cert play ahead of him next season and I really think he will still be their number 1 because he may not be the GK he once was but he still makes some very good saves at times and they still view him as world class. 

I think Henderson has promise but this accelerated talk of becoming Uniteds number 1 isn’t purely down to how well he has done but how poorly De Gea has done this last 2 seasons with high profile mistakes. Henderson has made mistakes this season also but the scrutiny of making mistakes at a Sheffield United is nothing compared to a Man United or Chelsea. He maybe isn’t necessarily ready to be a number 1 GK at a top 4 club but again, it would be unfair to say that without him actually playing at one. I think of some of the GKs who were good at smaller teams in the PL and struggled when they got bigger moves such as Asmir Begovic, who was extremely talented at Stoke and undoubtedly a better GK than Henderson right now imo when we signed him but he never really was assured here at all and looked very ordinary and shaky at times. Mignolet as well although struggled maybe a strong word, didnt really improve at Liverpool if you ask me but if I am honest he did look a lot more assured for them than Begovic did here and was definitely one of Rodgers more successful signings out of a multitude of utter shite when you see the list but never to the level of what any of the top clubs GKs were imo.

Henderson has had good performances and I think he is a better GK than Pickford who was England’s number 1 at the world cup but honestly Pickford is pretty poor it wouldn’t be unfair to even suggest most of the decent English keepers in the PL probably have a better chance of being in the squad come the Euros next summer if Southgate is fair with his selections. If it were this summer you could say the likes of Nick Pope, Dean Henderson, Alex McCarthy, Ben Foster even Aaron Ramsdale and Fraser Forster after an impressive half season spell with Celtic looking particularly good in the Europa League also would be ahead of him potentially. Thats how badly his performances has flatlined. 

£55m is a bit excessive as well IMO, even if we did spend £71m on Kepa.

[ZAPHOD2319 4,819]

I think Willian just became our top target. FFS.

Lampard has been adamant that he wants Willian to stay at the club and is believed to have given him assurances he will play a key role next season despite the £37 million arrival of Hakim Ziyech from Ajax.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.espn.com/soccer/soccer-transfers/story/4148354/lampard-desperate-to-keep-willian-at-chelsea-sources%3fplatform=amp

[Tomo 21,751]

1 hour ago, Pizy said:

I just wonder if Henderson is actually the real deal or if he's just made to look good due to Chris Wilder's defensive setup in front of him. Pickford and Joe Hart were the last English keepers to get hyped to hell and back and they both turned out to be shit. Wonder if Henderson will fare better.

Very harsh on Hart, he was excellent in his prime.

[OneMoSalah 8,886]

1 minute ago, Tomo said:

Very harsh on Hart, he was excellent in his prime.

Yeah he was really good. Pep not fancying him really killed his career although he had made mistakes with Pellegrini but recovered, that was the final nail in the coffin when Pep binned him though. Weird how his career has panned out. 

[Tomo 21,751]

24 minutes ago, OneMoSalah said:

Yeah he was really good. Pep not fancying him really killed his career although he had made mistakes with Pellegrini but recovered, that was the final nail in the coffin when Pep binned him though. Weird how his career has panned out. 

He was already long declined by the time Pep got there. The rot started for him in City's second title winning season.

He was genuinely world class under Mancini.

[Panic 57]

6 hours ago, OhForAGreavsie said:

What we need is a US style budget cap; a single figure which applies to all clubs. Any club is allowed to spend up to the cap figure, as long as it can do so without falling into unsustainable debt. Just as now, club's books must be subject to annual inspection to ensure that this is so with heavy sanctions if the rules are broken. This is never going to mean that Walsall FC can compete with Barcelona, but it also is never going to mean that they are not even allowed to.

What sports are you referring to? If you are referring to the NFL or NBA then all teams would have an equal amount of money to spend on salary. For example, each NFL team had $198.2 million to spend in the 19/20 season. They don't have to spend this, but they don't get to keep the unspent cash(This is because of revenue sharing). There are some more details, but the NFL cap allows the "poor" teams to match the spending of the rich teams. Under an NFL style salary cap, Walsall FC could financially match Barcelona.

[Special Juan 28,142]

#Chelsea could buy a new goalkeeper this summer. #Blues are not satisfied of #Kepa, who could leave and come-back in Spain. The first choice of #Lampard is Jan #Oblak. Talks opened with agent of #AtleticoMadrid’s GK. The #transfer is not simple, but M.Granovskaia in action. #CFC

[blu35_army 551]

https://twitter.com/swearimnotpaul/status/1287824052581797889?s=20

Inter, Arsenal, and Chelsea are interested in Borussia Mönchengladbach defender Matthias Ginter, according to Sky Germany. As they should be. He's an excellent defender. #BMG #Inter #AFC #CFC

[King Kante 1,643]

7 minutes ago, blu35_army said:

https://twitter.com/swearimnotpaul/status/1287824052581797889?s=20

Anyone know of Ginter? 

[OhForAGreavsie 6,077]

37 minutes ago, Panic said:

What sports are you referring to? If you are referring to the NFL or NBA then all teams would have an equal amount of money to spend on salary. For example, each NFL team had $198.2 million to spend in the 19/20 season. They don't have to spend this, but they don't get to keep the unspent cash(This is because of revenue sharing). There are some more details, but the NFL cap allows the "poor" teams to match the spending of the rich teams. Under an NFL style salary cap, Walsall FC could financially match Barcelona.

Yes, it is the NFL where I first encountered the salary cap. When it was introduced it was about $35m! I no loner follow the sport as avidly as I did in the 80's and 90's, partly because of embarrassment at the name of my team. It's funny but I've been calling them Washington's NFL team for decades and now they do too. Well more-or-less they do.

I used Walsall to illustrate the point that some clubs will never be able, independently, to afford the spending of glamour clubs. Nor are they likely to attract an investor who would enable them to, but at least, under the cap, they would be allowed to do it if they could. Under the current system, it wouldn't matter if Jeff Bazos himself bought Walsall, the rule would prevent them spending much more than their natural level. As I said, this makes the current system financial unfair play. Budget caps, not just salary caps, must come to football.

It is, in my opinion, virtually certain that full revenue sharing will ever come to football. Even if it did, it would only be within divisions, not entire national pyramids. That could never make sense.. 

P.S. I also love MLB. Baseball is a wonderful, endlessly fascinating sport, but I hate the NBA with a passion so know next to nothing about it.

[DDA 9,941]

4 hours ago, Pizy said:

I just wonder if Henderson is actually the real deal or if he's just made to look good due to Chris Wilder's defensive setup in front of him. Pickford and Joe Hart were the last English keepers to get hyped to hell and back and they both turned out to be shit. Wonder if Henderson will fare better.

I'm sorry but Joe Hart was not shit. He was immense at one point. He pulled of some insane saves to keep 3 points in the bag for City. Yea, his career has gone down hill but he was never shit. Pickford on the other hand... he really was overhyped... absolute dogshit.

[OhForAGreavsie 6,077]

3 hours ago, Tomo said:

Very harsh on Hart, he was excellent in his prime.

Joe Hart is a great illustration of my attitude on goalkeepers. The wildly different opinions of his abilities come about because he does make brilliant saves, and he does mess things up too. All keepers make wonderful saves, pretty regularly in fact, and they all also make howlers. In my opinion, there just isn't enough difference between the best of them, and the worst of them, to ever make it worth spending superstar type amounts to get a goalie.

Unless your side's outfield squad is already the best in the world then a club will always, always, always do better to buy a cheaper keeper and spend more on the other ten positions instead. I can't prove it of course but I'm convinced that even those who disagree with what I'm about to say, will change their mind one day; If we had signed Allison, and Liverpool had captured Kepa, they would still be champions, and we would still have been fourth. The thing that makes them a much better team than us is their outfield players, not their goalie.

Two years ago I argued we should promote Bulka and forget signing Kepa because the £71m expenditure could never be justified. My idea was ridiculed at the time, but it would have been the right choice. Let's hope we are not about to repeat the error.

[Pizy 18,945]

31 minutes ago, DDA said:

I'm sorry but Joe Hart was not shit. He was immense at one point. He pulled of some insane saves to keep 3 points in the bag for City. Yea, his career has gone down hill but he was never shit. Pickford on the other hand... he really was overhyped... absolute dogshit.

Great for a few seasons in a brilliant City team. Then as soon as he left his career was basically over. Haven't heard from him since, really.

[NikkiCFC 8,334]

On 7/26/2020 at 1:31 PM, Vesper said:

Getafe went winless in their last 5 games, and scored ONE goal total, they won ONE of their last 12 La Liga games, and were shut out in 7 of those games, including v Levante, Alaves, Osasuna, Espanyol, and Celta Vigo (3 of those are bottom 5 teams, none are in the top half, other than Osasuna at 10th)

Yet Conte is ready to suffer 

[Panic 57]

1 hour ago, OhForAGreavsie said:

Yes, it is the NFL where I first encountered the salary cap. When it was introduced it was about $35m! I no loner follow the sport as avidly as I did in the 80's and 90's, partly because of embarrassment at the name of my team. It's funny but I've been calling them Washington's NFL team for decades and now they do too. Well more-or-less they do.

I used Walsall to illustrate the point that some clubs will never be able, independently, to afford the spending of glamour clubs. Nor are they likely to attract an investor who would enable them to, but at least, under the cap, they would be allowed to do it if they could. Under the current system, it wouldn't matter if Jeff Bazos himself bought Walsall, the rule would prevent them spending much more than their natural level. As I said, this makes the current system financial unfair play. Budget caps, not just salary caps, must come to football.

It is, in my opinion, virtually certain that full revenue sharing will ever come to football. Even if it did, it would only be within divisions, not entire national pyramids. That could never make sense.. 

P.S. I also love MLB. Baseball is a wonderful, endlessly fascinating sport, but I hate the NBA with a passion so know next to nothing about it.

I should probably clarify my point. I consider revenue sharing to be an integral part of the US style salary cap. So a salary cap is just FFP  imo. 

I don't think FFP is the only thing that is stopping a club like Walsall from competing. With a salary cap, Jeff Bezos could buy Walsall and spend multiple billions to improve the club. But he never would. Why? He would never see a return on his investment as Walsall isn't a big enough market. Look at Chelsea, P.S.G, and Man City. All are worth well over a billion dollars. If Abramovich were to sell Chelsea today, he would probably make over double on what he invested. Walsall would never provide such a return. Walsall is such an obvious example that almost no one with any business sense would ever try to create a footballing powerhouse out of that club.

So what about the less obvious clubs? What happens to Newcastle if they have an owner who comes in and invests £500million, doesn't see results, and decides to give up? The club would be financially ruined. This is who FFP is supposed to protect. A salary cap without revenue sharing doesn't make sense imo. I do agree that full revenue sharing doesn't make sense for football. But even within a division there are too many complications. Clubs have a huge incentive to push back against truly fair FFP because of relegation, for example.

 

[Simon1991 233]

5 hours ago, OneMoSalah said:

If it were this summer you could say the likes of Nick Pope, Dean Henderson, Alex McCarthy, Ben Foster even Aaron Ramsdale and Fraser Forster after an impressive half season spell with Celtic looking particularly good in the Europa League also would be ahead of him potentially.

Has anyone followed Ramsdale closely this year? Every time i saw him play this season he impressed me, but i honestly don't know him that good to know whether he's Chelsea material. 

With Bournemouth going down, he should be available at a reasonable price too.

[OhForAGreavsie 6,077]

1 hour ago, Panic said:

I should probably clarify my point. I consider revenue sharing to be an integral part of the US style salary cap. So a salary cap is just FFP  imo. 

I don't think FFP is the only thing that is stopping a club like Walsall from competing. With a salary cap, Jeff Bezos could buy Walsall and spend multiple billions to improve the club. But he never would. Why? He would never see a return on his investment as Walsall isn't a big enough market. Look at Chelsea, P.S.G, and Man City. All are worth well over a billion dollars. If Abramovich were to sell Chelsea today, he would probably make over double on what he invested. Walsall would never provide such a return. Walsall is such an obvious example that almost no one with any business sense would ever try to create a footballing powerhouse out of that club.

So what about the less obvious clubs? What happens to Newcastle if they have an owner who comes in and invests £500million, doesn't see results, and decides to give up? The club would be financially ruined. This is who FFP is supposed to protect. A salary cap without revenue sharing doesn't make sense imo. I do agree that full revenue sharing doesn't make sense for football. But even within a division there are too many complications. Clubs have a huge incentive to push back against truly fair FFP because of relegation, for example.

 

it's clear from reading this that you perhaps have not had a chance to look at all of the comments I've made recently in this thread on this subject, or perhaps more likely that I have not explained my point very well. I say that because you're repeating back to me some of the points I've made as if I had not made them. Usually when this happens it is the latter case and I have not explained myself too well. I'll try to do do a wrap up but it's 2:22 a.m. at the moment I haven't got the enthusiasm for it right now. 🙂

[Panic 57]

1 hour ago, OhForAGreavsie said:

it's clear from reading this that you perhaps have not had a chance to look at all of the comments I've made recently in this thread on this subject, or perhaps more likely that I have not explained my point very well. I say that because you're repeating back to me some of the points I've made as if I had not made them. Usually when this happens it is the latter case and I have not explained myself too well. I'll try to do do a wrap up but it's 2:22 a.m. at the moment I haven't got the enthusiasm for it right now. 🙂

I have read a few of your posts outside of the ones I replied to. I can somewhat understand why you believe I was just repeating points you already made. Allow me to try to clarify my points in a more concise and comprehensible way.

1. I believe that a "US style budget cap" requires revenue sharing. We both agree that revenue sharing is not very likely or possible, hence I do  believe you should not refer to a budget cap as "US style" if you're not proposing revenue sharing.

2. A salary/budget cap that allows clubs to " spend up to the cap figure, as long as it can do so without falling into unsustainable debt." Is substantively no different from current FFP rules. This is because current FFP rules are more strict than a salary/budget cap and will prevent the vast majority of clubs from spending more money before a salary/budget cap does.(Unless you are advocating for creating a cap well below what the top clubs are currently spending.)

In other words, a salary cap only prevents the top clubs from spending more. FFP prevents clubs from unsustainable debt.

3. The conclusion then is that you can't fairly bridge the gap between the less successful and more successful clubs without revenue sharing. Clubs will either never be able to compete, or we will regularly see clubs ruined when an ambitious owner comes in and spends beyond the clubs means. 

 

[Jase 43,479]

Fabrizio Romano might have just ended Nicolo Schira...

[Superblue 6,372]

10 hours ago, OhForAGreavsie said:

Joe Hart is a great illustration of my attitude on goalkeepers. The wildly different opinions of his abilities come about because he does make brilliant saves, and he does mess things up too. All keepers make wonderful saves, pretty regularly in fact, and they all also make howlers. In my opinion, there just isn't enough difference between the best of them, and the worst of them, to ever make it worth spending superstar type amounts to get a goalie.

Unless your side's outfield squad is already the best in the world then a club will always, always, always do better to buy a cheaper keeper and spend more on the other ten positions instead. I can't prove it of course but I'm convinced that even those who disagree with what I'm about to say, will change their mind one day; If we had signed Allison, and Liverpool had captured Kepa, they would still be champions, and we would still have been fourth. The thing that makes them a much better team than us is their outfield players, not their goalie.

Two years ago I argued we should promote Bulka and forget signing Kepa because the £71m expenditure could never be justified. My idea was ridiculed at the time, but it would have been the right choice. Let's hope we are not about to repeat the error.

A high quality goalkeeper will save you points throughout the season. 

Liverpool likely would have won the league this season with Kepa because they were so far ahead of everyone else but they wouldn't have accrued the amount of points they did. And in my opinion a better keeper would have had us in a comfortable third position, not fourth.

I think you can get by with a competent goalkeeper. That is where I would place someone like De Gea at the moment who makes a share of great saves, makes a share of bad mistakes but ultimately does most of the basics to a sufficient standard the majority of the time. 

Our problem is that Kepa isn't in the competent bracket. Although there have still been errors in the backline, in my opinion the shape of the team from a defensive perspective has improved through the season compared to the all out attack, gung ho nature of the opening games of the season. However that may not have necessarily reflected in the amount of goals conceded. 

Kepa causes carnage to our defence. Not being prepared or dominant to come for any corners or wide free kicks presents a massive problem defending them because the defence have to naturally then defend deeper to compensate. Similarly in open play having a keeper that the defence can trust breeds confidence to them. I don't think anyone has confidence that Kepa will save any shots at present which is a huge issue. 

Kepa is not solely to blame and won't completely fix our defence. There are still other things that need to be worked on both from a coaching perspective and possibly a recruitment one too. And you have allow that keepers will make a few mistakes through the year, even the top ones do. However in Kepa's case where it's not so much glaring mistakes, but instead fundamental deficiencies in his game. A better keeper in my opinion would make an immediate significant difference to the goals against column and in doing so, likely add a few points to our total. It doesn't have to be huge money like Oblak but it is absolutely vital we address the position this summer because for me, it's far more important to sort out now than left and centre back.