Chelsea Transfers

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10 hours ago, Strike said:

His contract expires in 25 and he doesn't seem keen to renew.

I'd pay 90-100m for Osimhen over 60m for Toney. 

yes, especially as Toney turns 29yo in late winter next season

[Vesper 30,160]

as this applies to a possible transfer for a GKer, I am posting this here

Analysing Chelsea’s Robert Sanchez: Aerially dominant and a spark to a progressive game

https://theathletic.com/4975306/2023/10/20/sanchez-Chelsea-analysis-kepa/

There is no more modern type of goal in elite football — and arguably none which more effectively infuriates supporters of the side conceding it — than a goalkeeper losing the ball to an opposing attacker having deliberately lingered in possession to “bait the press”.

Robert Sanchez has not conceded one of these goals in the first three months of his Chelsea career, but he has come perilously close to doing so on several occasions.

In the 24th minute of last month’s Carabao Cup tie against Brighton & Hove Albion at Stamford Bridge, for example, he lines up this risky pass down a narrow corridor formed of three opposition players towards a gap in midfield into which his team-mate Cole Palmer is moving:

The ball instead goes straight to the feet of Joao Pedro, who steadies himself and then attempts to chip a stranded Sanchez — cue a sigh of relief from the ’keeper when the shot lands on the roof of his net:

Nine minutes later, another Sanchez pass creates danger for Chelsea as Moises Caicedo, under pressure as he receives the ball 25 yards from his own goal, goes down seeking a free kick…

…and Brighton are gifted another glorious chance:

This time, Sanchez parries Ansu Fati’s shot wide but, behind his goal, the anxiety of the supporters in the Matthew Harding Stand had turned to anger directed at their new keeper.

No doubt fresh in the collective memory were other similar brushes with disaster, such as this loose pass to Alexis Mac Allister which might have turned a 1-1 draw with Liverpool into a home defeat on the Premier League’s opening weekend in August if Darwin Nunez’s touch had been more assured:

Or this attempted pass to Caicedo against Fulham at the start of this month which Andreas Pereira easily picks off by sticking out a leg but, fortunately for Sanchez, cannot control or divert into the path of a team-mate:

It is a struggle to find Chelsea fans who are fully convinced by Sanchez as the club’s first-choice goalkeeper and potentially costly lapses like the ones detailed above are a big reason why. By virtually every metric, however, he has made a very positive start to life as Kepa Arrizabalaga’s replacement — particularly within the context of how new head coach Mauricio Pochettino wants his team to play.

---

The days of “If in doubt, get rid” are long gone at the top level of the game; this is the age of elite coaches preaching cat-and-mouse possession, requiring goalkeepers to make more complex decisions with higher stakes when the ball is at their feet than ever before.

Sanchez’s errant passes have been memorable, but they have also been few and far between.

He has completed 77 of his 78 passes travelling between five and 15 yards and 138 of 141 going between 15 and 30 yards in the 2023-24 Premier League, contributing to an 88.4 per cent overall pass completion that is bettered only by his Brighton replacement Jason Steele (91.5).

The most striking thing about his distribution is just how often Sanchez attempts those short passes into the base of Chelsea’s midfield, as you can see from the graphic below:

Compare and contrast that with Arrizabalaga’s open-play distribution for the club last season, which alternated a fair number of central passes with balls into wider areas, particularly to his left:

This reflects a change of emphasis since Pochettino took over in the summer; he wants his two elite ball progressors in midfield — Caicedo and Enzo Fernandez — on the ball as early and as often as possible. Lateral passes to escape pressure have become options of last resort; the priority is to open up avenues for vertical passes, from either Sanchez or the defenders just in front of him, into midfield.

Chelsea create those gaps by splitting centre-backs Axel Disasi and Thiago Silva wide to either side of Sanchez when he has the ball, with both full-backs pushed on. This challenges opponents to commit most of the attacking half of their team to taking away all of the possible passing options once Caicedo and Fernandez present for the ball:

Sanchez is even encouraged to play these passes when opposing sides press high, with Chelsea confident they can move the ball quickly and accurately enough to generate an advantage elsewhere to progress the play.

Here, in that cup tie against Brighton, he aims a short pass towards Lesley Ugochukwu’s right foot (yellow arrow), recognising that the pressure is coming from behind his team-mate’s left shoulder (pink arrow):

This allows Ugochukwu to drop a shoulder, spin away from his direct opponent and compromise Brighton’s press by generating an opportunity to carry the ball forward into space:

Against the best pressing teams, this approach can be a real tightrope walk that requires the defenders’ spacing, Sanchez’s passing and the midfielders’ ability to create separation from their markers to all be near-perfect. But, so far, Chelsea have executed Pochettino’s build-up strategy very well and their success is reflected in many of the metrics.

While it must be noted they are yet to play most of the other high-possession teams in the division, Chelsea rank second in the Premier League this season for average share of possession (63.1 per cent), touches (773), passes attempted (664) and passes completed (574) per 90 minutes, behind only champions Manchester City in all four categories.

Their high-risk approach with the ball has yielded a greater degree of control that has also helped improve their defence; Chelsea’s opponents are averaging 0.91 non-penalty expected goals (npxG) in the Premier League this season, significantly down from 1.36 in 2022-23. Opponent shots on target per 90 minutes have also dropped from 4.2 to 3.4.

With and without the ball, it helps that Sanchez — who had joined from Brighton and trained with his new team-mates for barely a week when he was thrust into the side against Liverpool, following Arrizabalaga’s swiftly-arranged loan to Real Madrid in the wake of Thibaut Courtois’ ACL knee injury — has been able to count upon a defensive unit in front of him that has remained largely unchanged through the opening two months of the season.

Disasi and Silva have been Chelsea’s centre-back pairing for every minute of the Premier League campaign so far, and left-back Levi Colwill has also started every match. The right-back situation has only been rendered unstable by Reece James’ ongoing injury struggles and Malo Gusto’s red card last month against Aston Villa.

In front of that group, Fernandez and Conor Gallagher have also started all eight league matches, with Caicedo, who wasn’t signed until the day after that opener against Liverpool, the only significant recent midfield addition to the starting XI.

“That’s a challenge for any keeper — feeling strong and secure in the players in front of you, being used to their decision-making processes and them consistently being in the right place at the right time (to show for the ball),” says Matt Pyzdrowski, a former professional goalkeeper and The Athletic’s goalkeeping analyst.

“Every defender passes the ball a different way, so you build that familiarity for how you’re supposed to receive the ball. That will be key for Chelsea this year, to build on that familiarity. It all feeds into a goalkeeper’s confidence, which makes a goalkeeper play better.”

Sanchez, 25, has in turn given his team-mates confidence by using his 6ft 5in (197cm) frame to command his penalty area in a manner that was simply beyond the much smaller Arrizabalaga (6ft 1in), who successfully intercepted only 15 crosses in the entirety of 2022-23 (in 29 league appearances), punching all of them. Over his first eight league games for Chelsea, Sanchez has already intercepted 11, catching 10 of them:

“Him adding that (aerial) dimension gives big security to the team because they can defend higher, knowing they have a goalkeeper who is strong in the air behind them,” Pyzdrowski adds. “They can do their jobs knowing that if there’s a high ball into the box, the keeper is coming out and there’s no hesitancy. It makes their jobs easier.”

Chelsea conceded 12 goals from set pieces in 2022-23. There has been just one goal by that route this season: Nayef Aguerd nodding in a peach of a corner from James Ward-Prowse that found him unmarked at the back post for West Ham early in Sanchez’s second appearance in August. Replacing Arrizabalaga with Sanchez is one of many contributing factors to that improvement, but it is significant.

Sanchez has also made a positive start at Chelsea in terms of his shot-stopping.

There have been no obvious errors in any of the five open-play goals he has conceded, though some questioned how Villa striker Ollie Watkins’ well-struck shot from a tight angle was allowed to squeeze through his legs last month.

That game also featured several outstanding and acrobatic Sanchez interventions, including one leap to tip over a Nicolo Zaniolo volley that won the Premier League’s Save of the Month award for September. Overall, he has conceded 1.5 goals fewer than expected so far, ranking him eighth among the division’s starting goalkeepers.

But it is Sanchez’s distribution that has dominated the conversation around him so far, and it will likely continue to do so as Chelsea embark on a much more daunting run of fixtures.

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Chelsea also looked closely this summer at the man who is expected to start in goal for Arsenal at Stamford Bridge on Saturday.

David Raya compared favourably to Sanchez by most of the advanced goalkeeping metrics last season, but west London neighbours Brentford’s £40million ($48.6m at the current rate) asking price was deemed excessive and Ben Roberts, global head of goalkeeping at Cobham and previously on the staff at Brighton, was a key champion of Sanchez.

In these opening weeks, Sanchez has flashed plenty of the talent that so beguiled Roberts and thrown himself into Pochettino’s demanding, high-risk style of possession play. But things are about to get harder; Arsenal are the first of a run of teams Chelsea will face over the next six weeks who are better equipped to press them into costly mistakes.

What happens when Sanchez makes an error that leads directly to an opposition goal? How will Chelsea fans react? It is unlikely that Pochettino will hold it against him, given that he praised the Spaniard’s “character” to tighten up his distribution after hitting two loose passes against Brighton and added that the rest of the team did not “provide good angles to play” in the first half of the game.

“The coaches who want to play out understand that (mistakes) are part of the role, but they want a goalkeeper who can minimise those mistakes,” Pyzdrowski adds.

If your job demands that you court disaster on a regular basis, disaster will at some point befall you.

But by playing in the manner that Pochettino wants with this level of competence, Sanchez is adding more to Chelsea than the occasional loose pass might take away.

 

 

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Victor Osimhen wants time to decide whether to accept Napoli’s offer

https://thedailybriefing.io/i/138126666/victor-osimhen-wants-time-to-decide-whether-to-accept-napolis-offer

So guys, what’s happened with Victor Osimhen and what's next for the player? When the president of Napoli, Aurelio De Laurentiis, read out a public statement recently, he spoke about the player’s contract situation and said the club’s position on the striker hadn’t changed. That they have no problem with Victor Osimhen.

In the summer the player verbally agreed to extend his contract. He had the opportunity to shake hands but then he decided to take some time. He changed his mind - or at least that was the message coming from Napoli. After the president’s public statement, and in an official statement on their website, the club wanted to clarify that the president’s words were not to be taken as a negative comment.

That Napoli understood that Osimhen just wanted to take some time, and that there was still hope of a positive final outcome for everyone. Napoli will let him think about his situation and discuss his future with his people, and they will wait for his final decision.

So, what's the reality of this situation? Guys, from what I'm hearing it’s true that in August, Napoli presented a very important contract extension proposal to Victor Osimhen. The biggest salary in Napoli’s history was on the table to convince him to extend a contract which expires in the summer of 2025, but the contract extension is absolutely far from being done. There is no agreement, nothing has advanced or is progressing at this stage.

Napoli will have to clarify the situation quickly because clubs are interested in the player but - for January - it will be almost impossible for any club to sign Victor Osimhen. Even though anything can happen in the transfer market, the player will be at the Africa Cup of Nations and Napoli still want to fight for their targets this season. Only a crazy bid could change the situation because Napoli have absolutely no intention of entertaining any proposal or to negotiate with any club in January.

In the summer, it could be a different story. Chelsea are absolutely one of the clubs being kept informed on the situation, and this is very normal because we know they've been looking for a new striker for a long time. Ivan Toney is another of the players that they have information about, so let's see if Chelsea will decide to attack the situation because at the moment they're not negotiating and so we’re not even at the initial stage of this story.

[Vesper 30,160]

Chelsea seeking transfer opportunities - Osimhen, Musiala, and mystery name, PREVIEW: Chelsea vs Arsenal, England team Lampard would pick, Player Performance Review: Noni Madueke, Much more..

https://siphillipstalkschelsea.substack.com/p/sources-Chelsea-seeking-transfer

 

Morning People!

My mood is great, even though I think my own game is going to be cancelled tomorrow due to this constant rain in the UK right now. But I don’t even care, because Chelsea are back in action and for once, I am buzzing to watch them play! I’m not expecting miracles against a super strong Arsenal team, but I want to see fight and I want to see us match them up, and maybe, just maybe we can get something from the game. I’m happier with no expectations and us as underdogs, let’s put it that way.

You can read my full preview for the game including the predicted lineup, facts, head to head, and much more in here.

A big and exciting sourced story up next. It seems like Chelsea are making more big plans for the next two transfer windows, departures and arrivals. The club are seeking opportunities to make even more improvements, and they are eyeing up a few big names. You can read all about that in here.

As it was an international break just gone, I have been pondering England a little bit. But not the current England, the England of the future post Gareth Southgate. And this could also be connected to Chelsea. I believe the FA might want to speak to Frank Lampard about the role of England manager if he is available at that time, and rumours are that they will also want to speak with Jose Mourinho. So I have been pondering all that and more in here.

Noni Madueke was another star of this international break putting in some impressive numbers for the England U21s, and Luke Rushbrook was on hand to put his scouting glasses back on and do a performance review on Noni here for these last couple of weeks. He’s certainly knocking hard on Mauricio Pochettino’s door.

The last article for this week is our live blog from yesterday which you can find here. This covers ALL your latest Chelsea news, quotes, transfer rumours, injury news, and anything else from across the last 24 hours in one place.

We also had our latest Podcast episode last night. Myself and Jai were joined by the popular Chelsea Dodgers to look ahead to the Arsenal game on Saturday and talk all things Chels! You can listen to that here if you haven’t already.

Have a great weekend everyone and COME ON Chelsea!!! LET’S DO THIS!

UTC

Peace, Si.

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Sources: Chelsea's long term squad planning underway

More entertaining sagas are on their way!

https://siphillipstalkschelsea.substack.com/p/sources-chelseas-long-term-squad

Transfer sagas are truly addictive, some people absolutely thrive on them.

On this site of late, I have seen you all (and me) go through the emotions from the very top to the very bottom. Our most popular ever article on this site remains the Enzo Fernandez ‘Here We Go’ confirmation, and the most popular articles I write on here are always the sourced transfer articles. It’s exciting, entertaining, and dramatic. And as much as we hate a transfer saga if it does not go the way we expect or want it to go, we also cannot help but get truly pulled in by them and love them as well.

The point of writing all the above?

Well, based on what I am hearing this week, we might need to strap in and expect more sagas coming up.

Whilst Chelsea might have gone a long way to building the ‘complete’ squad and perhaps only need one or two more signings to have that, I am told that the club are already looking for opportunities next summer and if such opportunities come along to sign big players who will improve what we have in a certain position, then they will not hesitate in trying to get said deal done.

This is why I am really now keeping a close eye on the Victor Osimhen situation, because Chelsea certainly are. But there will be other ‘opportunities’ that could come up for Chelsea to sign a star or improve what they have, and they are already in planning for some of those situations.

I’ve spoken to people close to Jamal Musiala and I don’t see him coming back to Chelsea unfortunately. But that doesn’t mean we wont try - those are the kind of opportunities arising that I am talking about.

I was given one exciting name from my top source yesterday, but we aren’t allowed to reveal that name yet for a few reasons. I am ensured that I will be able to report it soon, so keep an eye on the page for that down the line.

But the long-term squad planning is well underway now, even for next summer. And that means potential departures as well as arrivals. Although the squad on the whole is close to being built and being the ‘finished article’ as such, the club are wise to always be seeking out potential chances to improve what we have even more. Remember, they want to get Chelsea back to the VERY top, and not just close to it.

Mauricio Pochettino, as previously reported here, will be heavily involved in all of these decisions now going forward as well. And as we know, he is keen to add a little more proven experience to the ranks.

I think we will be seeing plenty more exciting transfer sagas moving forward!

Simon Phillips

[Fulham Broadway 17,311]

Chalobah now in tug of war between Roma and Bayern. I know opinions are similar to arseholes, we all have them but blowing my own trumpet have rarely been wrong about letting the wrong players go - maybe not the level of gross incompetency of letting De Bruyne and Salah go and become World class but its criminal to let Chalobah and Hall go.

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there are only 10 or so of remotely available offensive players who could be that 'mystery man' and who are actually remotely in the same 'WOW' class as Osimhen and Musiala (Toney is obviously not a mystery man)

Vinicius Junior can ONLY be put here IF

A. Mbappe comes to Real

B. Mbappe refuses to play CF or they get a CF

C. Vini refuses to move from LW to RW

D. Mbappe also refuses to play RW

E. Rodrygo is also in the same category as 'only if a lot of dominoes all fall rightly'

and I cannot see other coming here if we e do not have CL on lockdown every year

 

so, the list:

Rafael Leão
Florian Wirtz    
Khvicha Kvaratskhelia 
Lautaro Martínez 
Leroy Sané (last year on my lists, he turns 29yo in mid January of next season)
Xavi Simons  

Dušan Vlahović   
Alexander Isak  
Evan Ferguson  
Lucas Paquetá  

then, not quite at that level of 'WOW'

Kingsley Coman  
Jonathan David 
Ollie Watkins  
Mathys Tel (insane potential though, could easily be a WOW soon)
Kaoru Mitoma 
João Félix (very doubtful) 
Dani Olmo  
Eberechi Eze 
Jarrod Bowen  
Loïs Openda 
Federico Chiesa  
Mikel Oyarzabal  
Serhou Guirassy

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USA captain Tyler Adams out 4 plus months after hamstring surgery
 

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38 minutes ago, Fulham Broadway said:

Chalobah now in tug of war between Roma and Bayern. I know opinions are similar to arseholes, we all have them but blowing my own trumpet have rarely been wrong about letting the wrong players go - maybe not the level of gross incompetency of letting De Bruyne and Salah go and become World class but its criminal to let Chalobah and Hall go.

Hall perhaps

Trevoh, no, not for me

I rate all of these remotely available right footed CBs above him:

Matthijs de Ligt 
Marquinhos  (he is not happy at PSG)
António Silva  
Bremer
Giorgio Scalvini
Mohamed Simakan 
Robin Le Normand 
Jean-Clair Todibo  
Malick Thiaw  
Ousmane Diomande  
Nicolò Casale   
Kevin Danso   
Danilho Doekhi  

youth

Leny Yoro  

[nyikolajevics 2,692]

1 hour ago, Fulham Broadway said:

Chalobah now in tug of war between Roma and Bayern. I know opinions are similar to arseholes, we all have them but blowing my own trumpet have rarely been wrong about letting the wrong players go - maybe not the level of gross incompetency of letting De Bruyne and Salah go and become World class but its criminal to let Chalobah and Hall go.

 

I don't expect Chalobah to become world class, even if he joins Bayern. However, he is very solid at CB and RB too, good option. Disasi and Badiashile are similar age and costed around 40 million. If we sell Chalobah we need again around 40 million to have this level as backup option. Or we promote Humprhreys.

 

Hall, I feel his ceiling is very high. If he improves his finishing I can see him become a Bale-ish type player, he has the qualities.

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3 minutes ago, nyikolajevics said:

Humprhreys

is another left footed LCB

assuming we sell Trevoh, Thiago leaves, and Fofana is perma fucked

we are down to only one righted footed CB: Disasi

our other 3 CBs will all be lefties

Levi Colwill 
Benoît Badiashile
Bashir Humphreys

plus CuCu, another lefty
 

[Fulham Broadway 17,311]

53 minutes ago, Vesper said:

Hall perhaps

Trevoh, no, not for me

Yes the list you show are excellent players (well the ones i'm familiar with, though i dont have your football wider knowledge) but Trevor you could easily see as part of our past glory teams, he had the potential to become Chels through and through which as we've seen is a great asset as to just buying so called 'quality' off the shelf which we've seen go tits up on how many occasions. Also his versatility is underated. I could sniff the fact he was being offloaded, once a player makes one or two mistakes 2nd chances are rare (unless youre cucu) Anyway its only opinions as I said..

[mkh 581]

West Ham are among Ian Maatsen's growing list of admirers, and Chelsea ideally want to tie him to a long-term contract despite his lack of playing time.

So far, Maatsen has rejected two contract offers, and if Chelsea fail to strike an agreement over fresh terms, they could entertain offers again this January

Trevoh Chalobah is set to become the next casualty of Todd Boehly's ruthless Chelsea regime - after Mauricio Pochettino was handed total transfer control.

(@RyanTaylorSport)

 

I think Chalobah, Maatsen and Sarr will be sold in January and Madueke, Washington, Broja (if a new ST comes) and Ugochukwu will be loaned.

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Injured Bundesliga top goalscorer Guirassy to miss 'a few weeks'

Berlin (AFP) – Bundesliga top goal scorer Serhou Guirassy "will not be available for a few weeks" due to a hamstring injury, the striker's club Stuttgart announced on Sunday.

https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20231022-injured-bundesliga-top-goalscorer-guirassy-to-miss-a-few-weeks

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No truth to Victor Osimhen and Liverpool rumours

https://thedailybriefing.io/i/138210962/no-truth-to-victor-osimhen-and-liverpool-rumours

Another player we can be sure is one to watch in 2024 is Victor Osimhen. I’ve had many fans asking me about Chelsea’s interest, and also about Manchester United negotiating for him over a year ago.

I can say that Chelsea are still keeping an eye on Osimhen, but despite some media reports in Italy stating that he’s agreed a contract with Liverpool, my understanding is that he hasn’t agreed anything with any club. There is not even an agreement over a new contract with Napoli, despite receiving a huge offer from his current club.

Osimhen will take his time, but for now I can say the links with Liverpool are not true. Of course, Liverpool and many other clubs are keeping an eye on top strikers around Europe, but nothing is agreed, Osimhen will take his time. We’ll have to wait and see how it will evolve, even if it is sure to be one to watch in 2024.