Chelsea 2022/2023 | THIS IS LAST YEARS THREAD YOU NUMPTIES

[WeePat]

Exactly, it happens both sides. So it's odd to take these PR pieces as gospel to make arguments, apparently 'Well documented" too.

Results wasn't good enough and Tuchel is sacked, all this "he didn't want to involve in transfer" is all nicely planted by your owner.

I mean there have to a bit of truth in them somewhere. It can't all be fanfiction invented out of thin air. I don't know about the specifics and what lead to what but it seems plausible to me that it was more of a personality clash than just a couple of bad results. You may well be right of course, the timing (just after the window closed) was very odd.

 

[WeePat]

Didn’t Boehly fall out with Cech and Marina though over Lukaku?

Still don’t see why he couldn’t have arrived at the club with a plan and strategy from the start. Either rip it up and get going from the off or go with what recruitment you have for this window and gradually phase it out.

As it happened he just pussy footed about to the extent he even sacked Tuchel after the season started claiming they didn’t share the same vision.

I think whatever way you look at it Boehly hasn’t had a good start and it could have definitely been avoided.

A disagreement yes, they wanted to keep around and persist with him, which is understandable, they were the ones that wasted all that money on him. Boehly and the new owners (he gets all the publicity but Eghbali has been with him every step of the way) thought it was best to send the problem away.

 

[roonster09]

I mean there have to a bit of truth in them somewhere. It can't all be fanfiction invented out of thin air. I don't know about the specifics and what lead to what but it seems plausible to me that it was more of a personality clash than just a couple of bad results. You may well be right of course, the timing (just after the window closed) was very odd.

Ofcourse there will be truth but then you need context and what exactly was said. It's very easy to manipulate what was said based on who wants to come out of some scene looking good.

 

[TheReligion]

A disagreement yes, they wanted to keep around and persist with him, which is understandable, they were the ones that wasted all that money on him. Boehly and the new owners (he gets all the publicity but Eghbali has been with him every step of the way) thought it was best to send the problem away.

To totally leave the club must have been more than a disagreement..

Point being if the plan all along, as being made out, was to change everything why not go in with your own people ready to go (and coach) rather than waste a window, blow lots of cash and hamper Potter so badly.

Doesn’t add up really.

 

[Mb194dc]

Pretty certain Boehly got rid of Tuchel only because he was clearly mentally done by his divorce.

It's telling he's gone to India not back to football straight away.

Potter hasn't been hampered. We bought good players, just paid 2x market value for them.

Cucu will be a backup, Fofana I expect will start when fit. Koulibaly probably a backup also when play a back 4. CB will be Fofana and Chalobah.

We're in transition, will be lots of squad turnover in the next 2 or 3 windows. The cycle for Silva, Kante, Azpi, Jorginho is pretty much done.

I expect Potter to get time, if we still have problems after January 2024 then he'll be in trouble.

Rome wasn't built in a day.

 

[TheReligion]

Pretty certain Boehly got rid of Tuchel only because he was clearly mentally done by his divorce.

It's telling he's gone to India not back to football straight away.

Potter hasn't been hampered. We bought good players, just paid 2x market value for them.

Cucu will be a backup, Fofana I expect will start when fit. Koulibaly probably a backup also when play a back 4. CB will be Fofana and Chalobah.

We're in transition, will be lots of squad turnover in the next 2 or 3 windows. The cycle for Silva, Kante, Azpi, Jorginho is pretty much done.

I expect Potter to get time, if we still have problems after January 2024 then he'll be in trouble.

Rome wasn't built in a day.

Potter has been hampered tbf.

Brought in when the window has shut, no pre-season and no time to work with the players. That’s not how you bring in a new coach that you allegedly want to work on a long term vision and have apparently admired and fancied him for ages..

The Boehly window was totally fudged.

 

[WeePat]

Ofcourse there will be truth but then you need context and what exactly was said. It's very easy to manipulate what was said based on who wants to come out of some scene looking good.

You're not wrong, to be honest but the general idea of Tuchel and the ownership not getting along seems plausible to me, even if we take some of the details and specifics around the clash of personalities with a grain of salt.

 

[WeePat]

To totally leave the club must have been more than a disagreement..

Point being if the plan all along, as being made out, was to change everything why not go in with your own people ready to go (and coach) rather than waste a window, blow lots of cash and hamper Potter so badly.

Doesn’t add up really.

I can't remember all the details around this to be honest, but I'm sure Cech left on his own once Marina had left, who was going to leave anyway at the end of the window. I don't know if them leaving was exclusively because of that disagreement.

 

[weetee]

Pretty certain Boehly got rid of Tuchel only because he was clearly mentally done by his divorce.

It's telling he's gone to India not back to football straight away.

That's some armchair assumption if I ever saw one. He had some stressfull years at PSG, then got immediately into an even more stressful job at Chelsea. His divorce certainly plays its part but what big job opportunity was there so far anyway? Wolverhampton? Aston Villa?

 

[Rnd898]

To totally leave the club must have been more than a disagreement..

I don't think Marina and Cech were ever going to stay long term under the new ownership and I'm pretty sure the initial plan was for them to just oversee the summer transfer window and then move on for the new owners to bring in their own backroom staff. Any disagreements they may have had about Lukaku or other transfer plans just accelerated their departure.

Marina especially was an embodiment of the Abramovich reign and from a PR persepective alone keeping a Russian executive with very close ties to sanctioned ex-owner running the club could have been problematic. She had also gotten used to having the final say in pretty much every club decision for years and I don't think Boehly or any of the other prospective club buyers we had in the running would have been happy to give her full control going forward.

So far the transition from one owner to another hasn't been as smooth as we'd maybe have hoped but I'll reserve my judgement till I start seeing their plans to come into fruition. Same goes for Potter too btw.

 

[roonster09]

You're not wrong, to be honest but the general idea of Tuchel and the ownership not getting along seems plausible to me, even if we take some of the details and specifics around the clash of personalities with a grain of salt.

Yeah, even I think they had issues. Just the details that people using so confidently, I hope they know football world is full of manipulation/PR stuff.

Just look at Ronaldo or Piers Moron.

 

[Mb194dc]

That's some armchair assumption if I ever saw one. He had some stressfull years at PSG, then got immediately into an even more stressful job at Chelsea. His divorce certainly plays its part but what big job opportunity was there so far anyway? Wolverhampton? Aston Villa?

I don't think so, it's been well publicized. Yes he had stressful years but his personal life was solid prior to this year. Media reports indicate Tuchel private life and his new Brazilian gril was even gossip in the dressing room. Most importantly, we could see the teams performances go off a cliff and no reaction from Tuchel. We kept playing Mendy earlier this season, despite howler after howler and VAR bailing us out. When he left our points total was flattering and the Zagreb away game...

I don't think the version of Tuchel we saw at the start of this season was the same one who took over from Lampard. Ultimately he'll sort himself out and still be a top manager, just a question of how long that takes.

 

[ZolaWasMagic]

I hope Jan window is a big improvement wise in relation to the flurry of bids. Seems he has started to bring in a recruitment team lately, though

 

[TheMagicFoolBus]

Well he didn't have an option, as the only football person left in the building was Tuchel. It was transitional window, so yeah in hindsight it would have been better to hold off on the spending until a sporting director was hired, but at the same time, there were gaping holes in the team that needed to be filled with the team losing losing several key players, and who was going to do that work with Marina and Cech gone? I understand his preferences of wanting to be left alone to coach the team, but in that situation I can understand how the friction between Tuchel and ownership could happen, when he was required to do a bit more than coaching for literally one summer window.

Personally, though I loved Tuchel, I don't have a real issue with his sacking because, if there was really friction between him and the owners then that would likely have just reared it's ugly head a later date if left to fester. Ripping the band aid off quickly was probably the right call.

Oh I agree that Tuchel was pressed into the role - what I find ludicrous is to then justify his sacking due to his reluctance to take something on that was beyond what he signed up for.

 

[weetee]

I don't think so, it's been well publicized. Yes he had stressful years but his personal life was solid prior to this year. Media reports indicate Tuchel private life and his new Brazilian gril was even gossip in the dressing room. Most importantly, we could see the teams performances go off a cliff and no reaction from Tuchel. We kept playing Mendy earlier this season, despite howler after howler and VAR bailing us out. When he left our points total was flattering and the Zagreb away game...

I don't think the version of Tuchel we saw at the start of this season was the same one who took over from Lampard. Ultimately he'll sort himself out and still be a top manager, just a question of how long that takes.

Of course he didn't. I totally agree. But there was A LOT happening in the meantime and his divorce likely was just the icing on the cake. And taking his time-out in India as proof is still a bit of an armchair assumption (no offense) since his stock is just too good still not to wait for some big club to come around - which likely will take until next season. Juve eventually earlier but they are also a mess of a club so not sure he'll go there right now.

 

[Donaldo]

Pretty certain Boehly got rid of Tuchel only because he was clearly mentally done by his divorce.

It's telling he's gone to India not back to football straight away.

Potter hasn't been hampered. We bought good players, just paid 2x market value for them.

Cucu will be a backup, Fofana I expect will start when fit. Koulibaly probably a backup also when play a back 4. CB will be Fofana and Chalobah.

We're in transition, will be lots of squad turnover in the next 2 or 3 windows. The cycle for Silva, Kante, Azpi, Jorginho is pretty much done.

I expect Potter to get time, if we still have problems after January 2024 then he'll be in trouble.

Rome wasn't built in a day.

Rome was definitely built on speculation.

 

[WeePat]

Oh I agree that Tuchel was pressed into the role - what I find ludicrous is to then justify his sacking due to his reluctance to take something on that was beyond what he signed up for.

Well if the relationship soured, then I guess not much can be done about it. It’s a shame though, because Tuchel was absolutely the guy I saw being here for a while longer.

 

[Dancfc]

Well if the relationship soured, then I guess not much can be done about it. It’s a shame though, because Tuchel was absolutely the guy I saw being here for a while longer.

I can never prove it but I have a suspicion him saying he had no options in midfield when Chuck and Gilmour were on the bench was the final straw.

I feel the main bone of contention was Clearlake want a more sustainable path of promoting/buying young players where Tuchel was more keen on the goals for the here and now and that was the straw that broke the camels back.

I do hope if that's the project we stick to it (ie if a time comes where we have to let Potter go find a similar manager that buys in). Part of what got us into such a mess was starting to build for a longer term side to then bring Mou back when in the middle of overseeing it.

 

[Powderfinger]

I think broadly speaking its pretty hard to predict what direction Chelsea will go over the next 3-4 years. Everything from a climb back to the very top of the game and a prolonged period of mediocrity in the 5-7th place range seems possible to me.

They are changing lots of things within the club, with new directors, new recruitment models, new manager, etc. But change doesn't always lead to good results. Sometimes you make big changes and what you implement turns out to be shit. The initial changes to the club at Arsenal post-Wenger were a total disaster, even though they were supposed to modernize the club in many ways, including a remaking of the scouting, recruitment, and data operations. I won't even get into what happened at United post SAF. Let's just say that the transition from one era to the next is not always smooth and successful.

The level of spending on players also seems very uncertain to me, despite many confident predictions from Chelsea fans about this. What we know is that the club is owned by private equity guys and that they came into ownership broadly believing (and promising) that they would make substantial investments in players in order to attain the on-field success that would help them drive value in terms of revenue and asset growth. That all sounds good from a Chelsea fan perspective. But the two things that are unquestionably true about PE people is that they care about making money above all else and that they are absolutely willing to update their strategy based on new information. If they discover that pouring 150-200m into transfers every summer and carrying a wage bill well above what you'd expect given revenues are not paying off in the way they anticipated, they're not going to just keep throwing good money after bad. They're going to quickly pivot to a new strategy where they focus on smarter spending, lower wage bill, etc.

What I can say with some confidence is that Chelsea had a really bad summer if the goal was to build a new team around younger players. The age profile of Sterling, Koulibaly, and Aubameyang makes no sense for that kind of plan and the wages handed out to some of these guys were reportedly massive. Fofana is the only first team player they signed that really profiles as a key building block for the next 3-4 years yet they spent 280m euro in transfer fees and probably committed like 1.2m pounds per week in wages to the quintet of Sterling/Koulibaly/Auba/Cucurella/Fofana. Combine that with a number of other lingering roster/wage bill headaches - for example, Lukaku looks like he is coming back - and its not the easiest situation for a rebuild.

 

[Synco]

Well he didn't have an option, as the only football person left in the building was Tuchel. It was transitional window, so yeah in hindsight it would have been better to hold off on the spending until a sporting director was hired, but at the same time, there were gaping holes in the team that needed to be filled with the team losing losing several key players, and who was going to do that work with Marina and Cech gone? I understand his preferences of wanting to be left alone to coach the team, but in that situation I can understand how the friction between Tuchel and ownership could happen, when he was required to do a bit more than coaching for literally one summer window.

Personally, though I loved Tuchel, I don't have a real issue with his sacking because, if there was really friction between him and the owners then that would likely have just reared it's ugly head a later date if left to fester. Ripping the band aid off quickly was probably the right call.

But it must also be mentioned that he had already done that a lot (too much) at that point, steering both the team and club media relations through the Covid/sanctions period.

I think it's quite clear that part of Tuchel's frustration with the new owners was that he was expected to spend even more crucial time off coaching, while he felt he needed 100% effort to get the team back on track, to recover lost ground in terms of team development and key players.

So I think it's likely that, from his perspective, stripping down the club hierarchy and expecting him to compensate was the exact wrong way to proceed in what was already a precarious situation. And it's also obvious the owners wanted to rely quite heavily on his help in restarting the club.

Just my take from what I gathered, of course.

 

[SirReginald]

What I can say with some confidence is that Chelsea had a really bad summer if the goal was to build a new team around younger players. The age profile of Sterling, Koulibaly, and Aubameyang makes no sense for that kind of plan and the wages handed out to some of these guys were reportedly massive.

It only makes no sense if your looking at it with no perspective. We couldn’t renew contracts, Rudiger and Christensen walk out. Werner, Pulisic and Ziyech attempt to force their way out. We already needed new players.

It’s clear and obvious that we went for as close to replicas as possible to plug holes and each player signed was available on the market, therefore cutting negotiation time down tremendously. It just so happens that every single purchase is worse than the player we had originally.

With that being said, we are now getting the people in place with the contacts to get us the best young players in the world. There’s no guarantee with anything but there is a vision. It’s just a slow burner.

 

[cesc's_mullet]

As much as I'd love to see them face a long period of time toiling away, I think the issues are overblown right now.

They have some very good players to build the new squad around next season / moving forward. All of which will be around for years to come:

Kovacic (28)
Sterling (27)
Chilwell (25)
*Nkunku (25)
Mount (23)
Chalobah (23)
James (22)
Fofana (21)
Colwill (19)

And some players that should flesh out the squad in: Koulibaly (31), RLC (26), Cucurella (24), Havertz (23) and Gallagher (22).

Obviously main issue is finding a CF and a replacement for Kante and Silva. But they still have several quality players that have years left in the tank.


* provided he does join

 

[Niemans]

As much as I'd love to see them face a long period of time toiling away, I think the issues are overblown right now.

They have some very good players to build the new squad around next season / moving forward. All of which will be around for years to come:

Kovacic (28)
Sterling (27)
Chilwell (25)
*Nkunku (25)
Mount (23)
Chalobah (23)
James (22)
Fofana (21)
Colwill (19)

And some players that should flesh out the squad in: Koulibaly (31), RLC (26), Cucurella (24), Havertz (23) and Gallagher (22).

Obviously main issue is finding a CF and a replacement for Kante and Silva. But they still have several quality players that have years left in the tank.


* provided he does join

Chelsea have a good core of players, but between injuries and irregularity they are not giving their maximum potential.
That's their biggest challenge. Finding that regularity with the maximum potential of the players.

 

[Powderfinger]

It only makes no sense if your looking at it with no perspective. We couldn’t renew contracts, Rudiger and Christensen walk out. Werner, Pulisic and Ziyech attempt to force their way out. We already needed new players.

It’s clear and obvious that we went for as close to replicas as possible to plug holes and each player signed was available on the market, therefore cutting negotiation time down tremendously. It just so happens that every single purchase is worse than the player we had originally.

With that being said, we are now getting the people in place with the contacts to get us the best young players in the world. There’s no guarantee with anything but there is a vision. It’s just a slow burner.

That’s kind of the point. If you’re trying to build a new team around young players, you don’t look to find replicas to plug holes. And it’s not as if guys like Sterling and Koulibaly were signed as short term stopgaps given the contracts they received.

Boehly may end up putting into place a great new club structure but I think you need to be wearing some very Chelsea tinted glasses not to look at his first six months as a bit of a train wreck.

 

[Zaphod2319]

 

[Il_Cecchino]

The real problem with Chelsea is the recruitment: under Abramovich and now also with Boehly.
Last summer was a disaster: Boehly wasted 200m and the team is not better than last year.

Sterling: past his prime.
Cucurella: not better than Chilwell.
Koulibaly: 31 years old.
Aubameyang: 33 years old.

All for crazy money.

Chelsea lacks creativity in the final third. Needs two attacking players: a goal scorer (Nkunku is very good) and a winger with dribbling and creativity (for me Kvaratskhelia, or second choice Leao). Sterling is useless, but now is difficult sell him. Keep Broja, Harvetz and Pulisic and sell Zytech.

The mid needs a defensive midfielder (Kouadio Kone is my first choice, for sure not Edson Alvarez, very overrated). Sell Jorgingo. Keep Kovacic, Mount, Rlc, Gallagher. Plus the youngs Chukwuemeka, Hall and i like also Webster.

In defense recall Colwill and bring back Ampadu (a good player). Plus buy a sub for Reece (Frimpong).

This is a 200m market. But Boehly has just spent 300. Can Chelsea spent another 200m? The waste of money of this summer is a total disaster.

 

[TheMagicFoolBus]

But it must also be mentioned that he had already done that a lot (too much) at that point, steering both the team and club media relations through the Covid/sanctions period.

I think it's quite clear that part of Tuchel's frustration with the new owners was that he was expected to spend even more crucial time off coaching, while he felt he needed 100% effort to get the team back on track, to recover lost ground in terms of team development and key players.

So I think it's likely that, from his perspective, stripping down the club hierarchy and expecting him to compensate was the exact wrong way to proceed in what was already a precarious situation. And it's also obvious the owners wanted to rely quite heavily on his help in restarting the club.

Just my take from what I gathered, of course.

I think this is completely spot on. It was hugely unfair the burden the club put on Tuchel to be more or less the spokesman during the most tumultuous period in the club's history.

Well if the relationship soured, then I guess not much can be done about it. It’s a shame though, because Tuchel was absolutely the guy I saw being here for a while longer.

It still feels extremely thin-skinned to sack him, and based on just a few months. A potentially tense relationship with a world class manager versus a guy who's affable and seemingly content with just being there - choice seems pretty obvious from my perspective. Given the extent to which Tuchel was blindsided by the sacking it's pretty clear the relationship wasn't yet openly hostile or anything.

 

[Zaphod2319]

Given the extent to which Tuchel was blindsided by the sacking it's pretty clear the relationship wasn't yet openly hostile or anything.

If what has been said by multiple people at the club that Tuchel was not wanting to communicate with the new owners and wanted to do his job autonomously, much like Marina allowed him, it is also easy to see why people spending 300M pounds would not be interested in that type of relationship. I don't think there are any bad people in this scenario, just people that were not going to find a way to make it work.

 

[TheMagicFoolBus]

If what has been said by multiple people at the club that Tuchel was not wanting to communicate with the new owners and wanted to do his job autonomously, much like Marina allowed him, it is also easy to see why people spending 300M pounds would not be interested in that type of relationship. I don't think there are any bad people in this scenario, just people that were not going to find a way to make it work.

Given that the two most successful clubs in England currently more or less work off of that model, I'd say that it was pretty fecking stupid of the new owners to make that decision.

Finding a genuinely world class, top 5 in the world level coach is a lot harder than installing a recruitment hierarchy, especially if the plan all along was to just throw money at the people doing that for Brighton.

 

[TheReligion]

Given that the two most successful clubs in England currently more or less work off of that model, I'd say that it was pretty fecking stupid of the new owners to make that decision.

Finding a genuinely world class, top 5 in the world level coach is a lot harder than installing a recruitment hierarchy, especially if the plan all along was to just throw money at the people doing that for Brighton.

Bingo.

The fact is there was no actual plan and is been very much let’s react to everything so far.

 

[WeePat]

I think this is completely spot on. It was hugely unfair the burden the club put on Tuchel to be more or less the spokesman during the most tumultuous period in the club's history.



It still feels extremely thin-skinned to sack him, and based on just a few months. A potentially tense relationship with a world class manager versus a guy who's affable and seemingly content with just being there - choice seems pretty obvious from my perspective. Given the extent to which Tuchel was blindsided by the sacking it's pretty clear the relationship wasn't yet openly hostile or anything.

I don't know. I kind of get it to be honest from the club's perspective, but I also understand why a lot fans weren't chuffed with the decision. I think you're being a bit unfair categorising Potter in that way also.

 

[EtH]

Ronalod to solve the striker issues in January…

 

[WeePat]

Given that the two most successful clubs in England currently more or less work off of that model, I'd say that it was pretty fecking stupid of the new owners to make that decision.

Finding a genuinely world class, top 5 in the world level coach is a lot harder than installing a recruitment hierarchy, especially if the plan all along was to just throw money at the people doing that for Brighton.

But the plan wasn't just going after the Brighton set up. There were attempts to get the Salzburg guy and some other bloke in the RB hierarchy, and repeated attempts to seduce Michael Edwards, and he might still come. We've brought in the bloke from Southampton.

Tuchel, rightly or wrongly, is gone. If the fractious relationship stuff is true, if they couldn't see this relationship lasting in the long run, ripping the bandaid off seems like a better decision to me than letting things fester over a longer period.

 

[phelans shorts]

But the plan wasn't just going after the Brighton set up. There were attempts to get the Salzburg guy and some other bloke in the RB hierarchy, and repeated attempts to seduce Michael Edwards, and he might still come. We've brought in the bloke from Southampton.

Tuchel, rightly or wrongly, is gone. If the fractious relationship stuff is true, if they couldn't see this relationship lasting in the long run, ripping the bandaid off seems like a better decision to me than letting things fester over a longer period.

Looking at Southamptons squad right now I’d probably have avoided their head of recruitment, personally

 

[redcucumber]

It'll be interesting to see how Potter builds their forward line and attacking phases of play. They've got some really good, young defensive players but they feel uninspiring going forward. Nkunku will give them some guile if that happens. Gutting if they somehow pip us to top 4.

 

[WeePat]

Looking at Southamptons squad right now I’d probably have avoided their head of recruitment, personally

To be fair that guy was there was 5 minutes. I think he joined in the summer and then couldn’t turn down the offer from Chelsea. Hasenhuttl basically said this guy won’t be a big loss because he was only there 4 months. He spent 9 years being part of the City set up prior to joining Southampton.

 

[Rnd898]

Looking at Southamptons squad right now I’d probably have avoided their head of recruitment, personally

To be fair that guy was there was 5 minutes. I think he joined in the summer and then couldn’t turn down the offer from Chelsea. Hasenhuttl basically said this guy won’t be a big loss because he was only there 4 months. He spent 9 years being part of the City set up prior to joining Southampton.

Yep, Joe Shields joined Southampton in the summer of 2022 so he was only involved in the signings they made in the last transfer window.

Of the signings they made Romeo Lavia and Armel Bella-Kotchap have been great for very little money, the former is already being touted as a £50M player and the latter made the Germany squad for the World Cup. Some of the others they brought in haven't really had an impact yet but when you bring in eight new players with an average age of 20 they're not all going to be superstars immediately so maybe we'll see more from them once they develop a bit further?

Either way Shields' record of identifying young talent seems pretty good and his long history at Man City will certainly help him at his new job too. How his knowledge of working with young players translates to identifying and recruiting ready-made first teamers for a club of Chelsea's level is still a bit of a question mark but then again he's not going to be working alone but rather as a part of a larger recruitment team so maybe it's not going to be an issue?

 

[Dancfc]

Bingo.

The fact is there was no actual plan and is been very much let’s react to everything so far.

At times yes but to say it's completely been this way is extremely misinformed.

 

[TheReligion]

At times yes but to say it's completely been this way is extremely misinformed.

The majority of the time it’s been chaos at the club.

 

[GoonerBear]

Seems to be quite a staff that they are building up there. Are these direct replacements for the likes of Cech and Marina, or is Boehly restructuring totally and creating all these roles? My concern would be too many cooks. We seem to be in this sort of scenario with Gazidas, Mislintat, Sanllehi and in the end Edu all involved and overlapping.

It seems to work better for us more streamlined like the structure we have now.