Barrettinator

His nationality is irrelevant. We just want to see lads that came through the academy get a shot at the first team. Especially when they're talented.

City's PR team have gone to work pumping out rubbish to the entire media Yeah, he had a gun to his head, didn't he. These idiots swear they're Real Madrid now. Pity I don't hate them at all. Don't actually care for them one bit.

Didn't even know it was available. Wasn't that Zouma's shirt? Oh well.

Also, selling the likes of Willian and possibly Drinkwater might give us even more money to work with.

Matt Law says there's no truth to it. And even if there was, it's never going to happen. I've seen a silly report about them offering Andre Gomes plus money. Yeah I'd quite like to offer Drinkwater plus some change to them in exchange for Messi as well. Kante has 3 years on his contract. Kante is happy and this has been confirmed by his agent fairly recently. Kante isn't known to kick up a fuss either. He's going to get a new contract soon and that'll be the end of it.

That's a myth. Same thing was said about players like Mata, KDB, Silva, even Salah. You don't have to be physical if you're technical enough to beat the opposition before they run into you.

Probably going to be the Golovin lad we've been linked with.

Marina played a very, very dangerous game with ADL this summer but one way or the other, in the 11th hour, she won. Fair enough. First game of the season is 4 weeks away. Fully expect a slow start but it should be an interesting season overall.

I will be heading over to see the meltdown Been enjoying the meltdown on there the past 3 days actually. They're a hilarious bunch.

Dodged what bullet? That's ludicrous. He would have been perfect for City. Glad he came here.

Kante has his worst games when he's just sitting back. The vast majority of his best performances have been when he's moving across the pitch breaking up plays and winning balls. Jorginho on the other hand is very much like Xabi Alonso and prefers to sit back and dictate play. That solves it easily for us. Question now is who will be the 3rd midfielder as Sarri likes to play 3 in midfield.

Hopefully we can tie Hazard and Kante down to new contracts. As much as I like that Alisson bloke and accept that he would probably fit better with Sarri's system, Courtois is a top talent and we must do everything to keep him.

Comfortable top 4 finish hopefully. Same expectation I had in Conte's first season and he blew me away and exceeded it comfortably. Maybe I'll be lucky a second time. Sarri definitely needs to be given time though.

He's been the chief peddler of the '48 hours' and 'Hot Monday' schtick this whole time. I think he's probably close to Sarri's agent. Only way he could have gotten those photos.

Definitely taken with a potato. You can't tell me for sure that's Sarri.

I think it's a nothing rumour tbh. But if we sign Golovin then I can see this happening. Why can't we punt Drinkwater to West Ham or something?

Think every Chelsea fan should give this a read. https://thesefootballtimes.co/2018/07/13/why-maurizio-sarri-represents-chelseas-best-option-in-replacing-antonio-conte/

I think that's where you're getting it wrong. I know you don't like "reports" but this discussion is based on reports so I might as well give you the whole thing. The reports are that Buck drove to Cobham yesterday morning and informed Conte that he was being fired based on "a series of irregular behaviour". It has been mentioned that Chelsea are using the Costa debacle as a reason. None of the reports have said that was the ONLY reason they pointed to. It's just the most high profile one we know of and so journos latched on to it. It won't hold up as much if that was the only reason they have, especially because of how long ago it was. I don't hate Conte. I don't think I hate anyone that works in football apart from Rafa. I'm sure Conte the man is a lovely bloke and an admirable family man. But Conte the manager is who I'm irritated by (not hate). Loved the first season but his second season is a complete 180 both in achievements on the pitch and in his general attitude. And for what it's worth, no one in here has said Chelsea would take Conte to court out of thin air. Just that if Conte decided to go that route, Chelsea have more than enough to win and even turn around and sue him in the spirit of being petty. Not that we would take the first step. I actually wouldn't have cared if it was Enrique or Blanc or some average git who replaced Conte. As long as he was leaving. He has been wanting to leave for months now anyway. No point keeping him.

Fair enough. And I think the nature of the club's statement supports the stories that have been coming out. The closest thing to "you can f**k off now" we've ever seen Chelsea release for an outgoing manager. You don't know that. And you don't know if the penalty for such a behaviour according to his contract was termination. Btw, you don't believe the Costa text happened? You think the media are making that up? Even Costa has finally come out to confirm it himself.

I can go to the Jose thread and find posts like this after he was fired claiming all the media reports about what went on behind closed doors were BS and Hazard, Cesc and Costa were truly rats. When are we going to learn?

How does saying "okay, I'm leaving" equate to "running this club"? Where's the correlation? Hazard is the least confrontational top player in the world. Somehow he's "running the club" because he (along with a few other teammates) can't stand the manager anymore and would rather be elsewhere? Again, where's the correlation? Also, your employer doesn't pay you millions of pounds a year so you need to shelve that analogy. Conte was also an employee, wasn't he?

I assumed you missed the point I was trying to make about Conte needing to let sleeping dogs lie. All CFC have to do is call witnesses. I'm sure Costa would be more than happy to appear for that. There's a more than good enough case against Conte for acting very unprofessionally over the past year behind the scenes. Courtois has a big mouth. But I'm sure he and Hazard have been more convinced to move this season than even the 15/16 season. That is if Conte had stayed. Fought Costa. Fouth Luiz (his own signing). Fought Rudiger (his own signing). Fouth Willian. Tried to blame Hazard for his own tactical ineptitude in the United and City games. Filed out his 2 new assistants in the dressing room (where Emenalo was present) and presented them to the players as his new signings just to prove a silly "I haven't been gotten new players" point, etc. I'm actually highly disappointed in Conte from all these reports. And I hope no one in here tries to tell me they're lies. If you can believe Matt Law's inside reporting on CFC when it's positive then you should believe it when it's negative. A lot of our players have more than enough reason to mouth off to the press as well.

Definitely a troll.

I have no doubt it played a part in the club's decision. It's part of the reason why Sarri has never won a title. Before Napoli, all the club he had managed were Serie B and below. Low level, low budget clubs. Wasn't until he got Empoli promited to Serie A on a shoestring budget and stayed up while playing some beautiful football that he got hired by Napoli. Of course we're always going to look to sign players but a manager like this puts a lot less pressure on the board for signings and I'm sure they'll be loving that.

Eddie Newton and Carlo Cudicini apparently.