Dean

What a fantastic last couple of games. Tremendous performance, really enjoyable to watch which is soooo important, Palmer a real standout… I might have to become an optimist again!

Romero been approached by some dodgy betting mafia or something? Bizarre.

Yeah that was sooo much better and, above all, really enjoyable to watch.

We haven’t even had the recession yet. I struggle to see how this current reign can withstand that when it comes. But I’m repeating myself. It’ll be fun again to be a fan one day. But worse first imo.

Have to say I’ve really tuned out this season - focusing on other stuff more including other sports. I think too many are expecting a return to normal. We’re in the early stages of a more drawn out period in the wilderness, and I see a decent chance it ends with a forced sale by current owners.

No not really 😂 though his record would probably great if granted all those things . See my reply to bisright.

Sorry my post was a bit facetious. I do see the quality of Enzo, but can you build the case with fewer conditions attached? Eg just a new striker plus the players we already have? I have a bit of an aversion to our “let’s just get” culture, which btw I don’t think you are an exponent of based on other positions you’ve taken.

Kepa’s capable of being the best goalkeeper in the league… if we could just give him a world-class defence to protect him, a world class number 4, and Haaland as number 9.

Even with all my Balkan bias, I don’t get Vlahovic. If we had to go Balkan, I’d take Mitrovic over Vlahovic in a heartbeat.

This will probably get ridiculed but i think Havertz is one of the players that should be given the benefit of the doubt, shouldn’t be judged based on this season. To me he’s def not in the “unsalvageable” category at least. Been frustrating as hell but the whole team has been completely at sea this year and it has fed on itself as the season has gone on and confidence has just disintegrated. He still has age on his side, and potential. He might be a lot better than we’ve come to think and selling him could be a risk. It’s amazing how transformative a decent structure, proper coaching and a bit of confidence can be. My bigger concern is that those don’t materialise.

This is true and v valid. Partly why I said he to blame too. I guess though there are many questions here and I don’t claim to have any answers: why and what led to this decision? him, club, fans, social media? It seems to be a multi-way street. The social media part needs investigating imo. are the borders just TOO fluid? Should there be more friction introduced? rules put in place to incentivise more long-termism in the game? were we all just pretending all along that there was SOMETHING other than money driving things but we just threw in the towel at some point? many more but enough for now. I honestly dont know am just observing something that for me at least is an issue. It’s impossible for me to conceive of there ever being “club legends” again if this continues..

Ok. I guess I’ll be truly nailing my old timer colours to the mast here, but the prominence of discussions on eg how we can sell Mount to meet FFP rules reinforces my sense that something is wrong with the game. There is very little discussion of the “how do we get the best out of this squad” variety. Before anyone comes at me with “wake up, grandad, it’s all business now” and stuff about building brands, I get that. But it’s gone too far. Football was “all business” just two or three seasons ago but I feel even then fans would have made a stand re Mount. We’ve reached a point where there is zero attachment to any player - infected by some sort of weird adhd capitalism that’s probably been enabled by the smart phone and that i think will prove to be a poor recipe for success. As I’ve said before, people like to talk about “building for the long term etc” but nobody has the stomach for it. The players, and certainly Mount, are guilty here too btw. everyone’s tainted - I catch myself out sometimes. Then I ask myself - what’s it for? Without SOME continuity and community spirit, this is not going to work.

Yeah it’s definitely bigger than the players, and evidently bigger than the managers. We’ve been in this doom loop where each error begets a bigger error. Potter seems like more of a golden age by the day. Best one can hope for is we get out of that doom loop and things at least improve under Pochettino. Top half of table would be a start. Talk about lowered bar, but it’s the reality. Beyond that though, eg top four - no chance. have to consider the competition in terms of metrics like financial resources, overall management of club, squad, manager and how settled they are etc. on every single one of these, there are at least four clubs ahead of us, some of them by miles. Something would have to break elsewhere.

This is our fault too

😂

Frank looks really psyched for the ht team talk

Me too 🙂

I don’t disagree with much of what you’re saying, though on player power ironically I think this has been less of a factor in the current crisis than previous ones. Anyway, there are as you say plenty of legacy issues and factors beyond the owners’ control. But to my mind, there’s enough stuff within their control that they could have done a whole lot better. At the risk of coming across even more simplistic, at the end of the day - owners gotta own it 😉

Hello!

No I don’t think they did. But I don’t think they even can. Their confidence is shot through. I’m not saying they are blameless and you’ve also picked two - and certainly one - of the most dubious characters in our ranks. We’ve probably all been in relatable situations before, suffered losses of confidence due to a bad environment- whether work or school. We then found ourselves In a better environment where we got it back. We shared some responsibility for that dip too but we’re only human. They’re only human too. For some reason we expect them to be better humans than the rest of us just because they’re very good at kicking a ball around. in summary - players not entirely blameless. But It’s up to the owners and coaches to create an environment that coaxes the best out of their assets, including the bad eggs.

I’m going to jump to @El regresodefence on this. Of course the players have to give their all, ensure full fitness etc. But the “oxygen” needs to be right too. Instead, it’s clearly toxic. We’re always complaining about the players and calling for new recruits that apparently are going to turn our fortunes round. Then we get them and they become infected by this toxic air too. We’ve witnessed a classic spiral where confidence starts to desert them. So while it might not be TB fault that Kante has been injured, I think the owners have played a part in players’ inability to perform to their potential, create or even just play a simple pass. Lampard said this too. The players don’t want to be losing. They hate this too. I don’t rate Lampard as a coach. But we’ve all gone so “reverse halo effect” on Lampard that we don’t trust his assessment of something he’s clearly in a better position than any of us to assess. He’s absolved the players of blame - something that clearly doesn’t benefit him at all. Why would we not take his word for it?

In response to this and other interesting posts.. couple of points or things I (think I) learned about the world of finance. - on the “long term”. When finance types talk about the long term, sometimes they mean it, but at least as often it’s just a ruse to get their investors to commit capital and (crucially) not withdraw it. - on debt/leverage: when you’ve saddled yourselves and your assets with debt, you’re much more vulnerable to a downturn in the economy and less likely to be able to hold on for the long term. I don’t know the ins and outs of our debt situation or where it lies, to @OriginalSpoints. - there’s a very real risk of an economic downturn. In fact, it’s inevitable at some point. - there’s also a very real risk that the next crisis/downturn is one Boehly and co are extremely exposed to: one centred on private equity and venture capital (all crises are different and we haven’t had that yet). - if that’s the case, then in reply to @SydneyChelsea interesting post, these guys almost certainly won’t be around in 10 years. I also think that whatever worked in the 2010s - an era of extraordinarily low interest rates - will not work now. I wouldn’t be surpised if they are out within a year (not a prediction). - I don’t want to be on here talking about finance stuff, but unfortunately it seems pretty relevant right now, more so than “which striker should we get” etc.. - disclaimer: I’m very biased against private equity. I think it’s the scourge of humanity - the real “vampire squid” - that destroys everything it wraps its tentacles around or sinks its blood nozzle (or whatever the technical term is) into.

So. Briefly: - it’s not my intention to be condescending to anyone. - all I’m really saying is that things CAN get a lot worse - not that they necessarily WILL. Those of us who’ve been around longer are perhaps wiser to that possibility. Bigger clubs than ours have spent decades in the wilderness. How can anyone rule out the same for us? - re your points on building a brand image. I get that football is now a business and more money-driven than ever before. But talk about putting the cart before the horse! The brand is a secondary factor, a byproduct of the success on the pitch. It’s not like the first thing Roman said to himself when mulling buying Chelsea was “I vant buy football klub to beeld bryend eemeedzh.” - finally, even if we assume football is all about money and nothing else, we are on much shakier ground here than many realise. Clearlake, Boehly boast a lot of paper wealth, but how “real” is it? I suspect it’s to a significant degree (not completely as Todd and co are by many accounts very able and bright) the product not of their business acumen but a decade-plus period of history that was extraordinarily favourable to people taking risk with borrowed money. This paper wealth can evaporate quickly, as has been proven many times (though we still never learn) and the chances of that happening have, in my view, greatly increased as a result of their reckless spending since they took over Chelsea.

Was in the middle of crafting a response then my phone conked out. Will reply later.

Fair enough, though I think the “few and far between” isn’t quite accurate. He was probably our most consistent player for three seasons. Btw I didn’t actually ever describe him as a “complete midfielder”:) but I do feel compelled to defend kova. Broadly I don’t think anyone’s merits can be properly assessed based on this season.