Chelsea Transfers

[Superblue 6,372]

I thought Zakaria's cameo tonight for Switzerland was very good. Came on when they were truly under pressure and he just managed to relieve a lot of that by acting as a screen in front of the defence and blocking a lot of space and opportunities which had previously been there in the middle of the pitch.

I'm still pretty baffled how he hasn't played more for us when we're currently crying out for a player of his profile in the centre of our midfield. 

We're being linked with someone like Bennacer for £40m and there's talk of Rice for £70m+, but I'd love to really find out just what we have with Zakaria this season first. With Juventus' issues and seemingly desperate to get him off their payroll anyway, I'd be looking at spinning the usual Italian trick back on them (reject the buy clause in the loan contract, and try to negotiate a cheaper deal). I'd be inclined to throw a £10m bid at them "take it or leave it" and see what happens. Although of course this is completely pointless if Potter just simply doesn't fancy him.

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5 hours ago, Superblue said:

I thought Zakaria's cameo tonight for Switzerland was very good. Came on when they were truly under pressure and he just managed to relieve a lot of that by acting as a screen in front of the defence and blocking a lot of space and opportunities which had previously been there in the middle of the pitch.

I'm still pretty baffled how he hasn't played more for us when we're currently crying out for a player of his profile in the centre of our midfield. 

We're being linked with someone like Bennacer for £40m and there's talk of Rice for £70m+, but I'd love to really find out just what we have with Zakaria this season first. With Juventus' issues and seemingly desperate to get him off their payroll anyway, I'd be looking at spinning the usual Italian trick back on them (reject the buy clause in the loan contract, and try to negotiate a cheaper deal). I'd be inclined to throw a £10m bid at them "take it or leave it" and see what happens. Although of course this is completely pointless if Potter just simply doesn't fancy him.

I agree. His upside is potentially huge. He seems to be recovering quite well, long term.

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11 hours ago, ZAPHOD2319 said:

When asked about RM

“Real Madrid is the biggest club in the world, so who knows… maybe one day I can play there. I would like to, yes,” admitted Gvardiol when asked about the club’s apparently interested in his services.

https://www.thechelseachronicle.com/player-quotes/biggest-club-77m-world-cup-star-says-he-wants-to-sign-for-real-madrid-after-claims-Chelsea-could-bid/

This is not good, not at all.

Real are ageing out overall. Multiple huge retirements soon. Even a few of the ones I will list below are soon 30 or 31 (Rudiger, Cuntois, Alaba, Carvajal).

The will be buying massive new players.

Here are the only 30 (Alaba and Cuntois, not that 30 matters for a GK, and the soon rapidly in decline Carvajal, who simply must be replaced this summer or next IMHO) and unders ATM who are good to great on Real:

 

Thibaut Courtois   
Éder Militão    
David Alaba
Antonio Rüdiger   
Ferland Mendy (they are not satisfied)
Daniel Carvajal   (starting to age out now) 
Aurélien Tchouameni   
Federico Valverde    
Eduardo Camavinga    
Vinicius Junior    
Rodrygo  
Marco Asensio (meh and supposedly being sold) 

 

2, 3 years from now or so, only the 8 (counting Mendy and a GK) in bold will still be there and not at nearing or actually ageing out levels. Pretty crazy.

[OhForAGreavsie 6,060]

6 hours ago, Superblue said:

I'm still pretty baffled how he hasn't played more for us when we're currently crying out for a player of his profile in the centre of our midfield. 

 

19 minutes ago, Vesper said:

I agree. His upside is potentially huge. He seems to be recovering quite well, long term.

Our favourite theory about GP not playing Zakaria because the club wants shot of him in January and therefore wanted to preserve the possibility of him going on a new loan after Christmas hasn't panned out, but I still feel there must be some non-football factors influencing the manager's decisions re Denis's. Hard to make sense of it otherwise.

[OhForAGreavsie 6,060]

18 minutes ago, Vesper said:

This is not good, not at all.

Real are ageing out overall. Multiple huge retirements soon. Even a few of the ones I will list below are soon 30 or 31 (Rudiger, Cuntois, Alaba, Carvajal).

The will be buying massive new players.

Here are the only 30 (Alaba and Cuntois, not that 30 matters for a GK, and the soon rapidly in decline Carvajal, who simply must be replaced this summer or next IMHO) and unders ATM who are good to great on Real:

 

Thibaut Courtois   
Éder Militão    
David Alaba
Antonio Rüdiger   
Ferland Mendy (they are not satisfied)
Daniel Carvajal   (starting to age out now) 
Aurélien Tchouameni   
Federico Valverde    
Eduardo Camavinga    
Vinicius Junior    
Rodrygo  
Marco Asensio (meh and supposedly being sold) 

 

2, 3 years from now or so, only the 8 (counting Mendy and a GK) in bold will still be there and not at nearing or actually ageing out levels. Pretty crazy.

Ture, but the gravity of Real is what it is and everybody has to work around it.

The implications of a medical having been carried out means that, rightly or wrongly, I believe the Nkunku deal is done and has been since summer. For less convincing reasons I am hopeful that Gvardiol may also have already been wrapped up. If so then, worst case scenario, we have him for a few seasons.

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7 hours ago, OhForAGreavsie said:

Ture, but the gravity of Real is what it is and everybody has to work around it.

The implications of a medical having been carried out means that, rightly or wrongly, I believe the Nkunku deal is done and has been since summer. For less convincing reasons I am hopeful that Gvardiol may also have already been wrapped up. If so then, worst case scenario, we have him for a few seasons.

 

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pissed he is not coming in January, ffs!

[Superblue 6,372]

8 hours ago, OhForAGreavsie said:

Ture, but the gravity of Real is what it is and everybody has to work around it.

The implications of a medical having been carried out means that, rightly or wrongly, I believe the Nkunku deal is done and has been since summer. For less convincing reasons I am hopeful that Gvardiol may also have already been wrapped up. If so then, worst case scenario, we have him for a few seasons.

I think with Gvardiol we have to sell him potentially on that prospect, i.e. come to us which is a move upward from Leipzig where we're looking to build a young, dynamic team with a lot of potential upside but in 4, 5, 6 years time the option could be there for you to move to Madrid if you chose to.

Some of these players we may need to approach in the same way as Hazard - for how long you can keep them great but if they move on in the future and you've enjoyed 3-5 years of them playing at a high level and a good return on their transfer then so be it. Hopefully once they're here and perhaps if we start building and progressing ourselves back to challenging for the major trophies, it may be easier to keep players like him for longer or the bulk of their prime years like we managed to largely do with Hazard.

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1 hour ago, Superblue said:

Hazard - for how long you can keep them great but if they move on in the future and you've enjoyed 3-5 years of them playing at a high level

we had 7 monster years from Hazard (well that shit all-round 2015-16 10th place disaster notwithstanding)

7 years is more than enough play for me from a transfer to be considered a great buy

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sign him up

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[milka 3,390]

The feeling internally at Chelsea is that they want to rebuild the midfield with younger players - there’s new chances Kante and Chelsea could part ways in 2023. The feeling around players side and club side is that Kante WILL LEAVE on a free. 

@FabrizioRomano

 

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