The Marina Granovskaia Thread

[dansubrosa]

Funny how a picture can look so different after a few months. Now I’d take Hazard over these 3 signings!

Yeah I know he’s injured and fat now etc etc.

 

[Ballack & Blu]

She’s been great for business but the ultimate business is ‘on’ the pitch as that translates to the business side eventually even with someone with lesser talent as Marina. Aside from Hazard the impressive player sales are just looking at a problem backwards, we shouldn’t be in a position to need to offload these guys to stay afloat after awful transfer business, awful recruitment and mismanagement of coaching staff. She was a key figure of the board when Mourinho returned, her legacy is connected directly to the mismanagement of Lukaku, De Brune & Salah, then we have the screw up with Conte and of course Kepa, she’s making Emenalo look like f**king Tiki Begristain. Wish we could just leave her to player sales and commercial deals (Nike etc), we go into this tie with Atletico with 4 of the back 5 from our Barca 2017 spanking and Bayern spanking of last season, we have no direction with recruitment and there are clearly no football voices in this boardroom able to out-muscle.

Agree totally, the Salah debacle was horrendous, was reading a good piece about him,and Mous dislike of him, Marina, and Co are pretty useless when getting the right player, no problem with them spunking 22o million on players, just do your due diligence, not cherry pick the next bright new thing, in hindsight i don't think we needed Chilwell, Havertz or Werner, just spend better, Grealish, Ings, Soyuncu maybe....but of course we are never told what input into sales Lamps made, so you cant completely tar the board with incompetence..

 

[forbzy]

Agree totally, the Salah debacle was horrendous, was reading a good piece about him,and Mous dislike of him, Marina, and Co are pretty useless when getting the right player, no problem with them spunking 22o million on players, just do your due diligence, not cherry pick the next bright new thing, in hindsight i don't think we needed Chilwell, Havertz or Werner, just spend better, Grealish, Ings, Soyuncu maybe....but of course we are never told what input into sales Lamps made, so you cant completely tar the board with incompetence..

We needed a left back and Chilwell was one of the more highly rated options available. He generally did well for us while Frank was still manager (give or take a few games where the whole team was poor), and that makes sense as supposedly he was one of the 2 players that Frank really pushed for last summer (Rice being the other) . But we are currently not playing with a traditional left back so he has found himself on the periphery for now. I still think he was one of our better signings last summer along with Thiago and Mendy.

In terms of strikers with the system we play a better option would have been a traditional target man like Costa was back in the day. Raul Jimenez would have been a great choice and might have been signable for a similar fee to that we paid for Werner. Likewise in midfield the board should have listened to Frank and paid big money for Rice rather than Havertz. 

 

[bisright1]

. Likewise in midfield the board should have listened to Frank and paid big money for Rice rather than Havertz. 

Did you think that in July last year? 

Did anyone?

I don't think even frank thought that to be honest. It's just assumed by some now that he did. 

 

[Spiller86]

Did you think that in July last year? 

Did anyone?

I don't think even frank thought that to be honest. It's just assumed by some now that he did. 

Hard to know what Frank thought. The reports seem to say he asked for Chilwell and Rice,  Werner and Havertz were club buys, but I'm sure he didn't say no.

I for one thought it was a huge amount to spend on a largely unproven player, but I had more concerns about Werner than Havertz. Turns out neither have been great. I think the lesson here is always be very sceptical of German players who Bayern aren't fighting tooth and nail to sign. 

Havertz may yet come good (he's still very young) but he doesn't look like an 80m player. Once again it feels like we got carried away on Twatter hype and brings into question again our scouting and recruitment model. 

 

[Ballack & Blu]

I said during the transfer, we should move heaven and hell for Grealish, he is just what Werner et al need, that killer pass.

 

[forbzy]

Did you think that in July last year? 

Did anyone?

I don't think even frank thought that to be honest. It's just assumed by some now that he did. 

I didn't but I am not a scout . At the time I didn't have enough info to have a big opinion about Havertz or Werner, as I don't watch much German football. I did like what I saw from clips, but I would hope that our club did a bit more research than that and also considered whether the players were good fits for our system.

 

[forbzy]

Hard to know what Frank thought. The reports seem to say he asked for Chilwell and Rice,  Werner and Havertz were club buys, but I'm sure he didn't say no.

I for one thought it was a huge amount to spend on a largely unproven player, but I had more concerns about Werner than Havertz. Turns out neither have been great. I think the lesson here is always be very sceptical of German players who Bayern aren't fighting tooth and nail to sign. 

Havertz may yet come good (he's still very young) but he doesn't look like an 80m player. Once again it feels like we got carried away on Twatter hype and brings into question again our scouting and recruitment model. 

I agree about Havertz. I still think he is technically a very gifted player and he will probably have a good football career. It just remains to be seen whether we can see the best of him at Chelsea, without changing the way we play to fit him in.

 

[bisright1]

I didn't but I am not a scout . At the time I didn't have enough info to have a big opinion about Havertz or Werner, as I don't watch much German football. I did like what I saw from clips, but I would hope that our club did a bit more research than that and also considered whether the players were good fits for our system.

Well they clearly did do the research. They didn't just watch clips. They didn't miss anything. 

Lampard wanted this great defensive midfielder who we should have definitely signed apparently for 60m+ instead of Havertz, to play in defence. Which would have been a stupid thing to do when it's obvious he's top class as a DM. So let's not forget that either. 

Hindsight is a wonderful thing. But let's be realistic. Some players just turn out to be duds. Some take time to adapt. You can't avoid that. Hopefully these players come good. Personally I think Werner has been one of our best players in 2021.

 

[Spiller86]

Well they clearly did do the research. They didn't just watch clips. They didn't miss anything. 

Lampard wanted this great defensive midfielder who we should have definitely signed apparently for 60m+ instead of Havertz, to play in defence. Which would have been a stupid thing to do when it's obvious he's top class as a DM. So let's not forget that either. 

Hindsight is a wonderful thing. But let's be realistic. Some players just turn out to be duds. Some take time to adapt. You can't avoid that. Hopefully these players come good. Personally I think Werner has been one of our best players in 2021.

Scouts are paid to identify individuals who aren't duds and who will adapt to our team. I hope they come good too but I won't hold my breath.

Issue with our recruitment has been consistently identifying young foreign players with hype who haven't adapted to the Premier League. We have paid huuuuge money for many of these players.

We need a total change in our approach in my view. More focus needs to be placed on ability to adapt in England and suit our style of play. I dont think anyone who watched Werner regularly last year or with Germany is surprised he has struggled against deep packed defences with no space to run in to. This is after all exactly why Bayern have said they didn't pursue him.

 

[Spiller86]

Deleted

 

[Gol15]

Scouts are paid to identify individuals who aren't duds and who will adapt to our team. I hope they come good too but I won't hold my breath.

Issue with our recruitment has been consistently identifying young foreign players with hype who haven't adapted to the Premier League. We have paid huuuuge money for many of these players.

We need a total change in our approach in my view. More focus needs to be placed on ability to adapt in England and suit our style of play. I dont think anyone who watched Werner regularly last year or with Germany is surprised he has struggled against deep packed defences with no space to run in to. This is after all exactly why Bayern have said they didn't pursue him.

Despite Werner struggling he has been able to contribute to our attack, both Lampard and Tuchel play him even when he isn't scoring. We are among the top 5 teams when it comes to scoring goals.

Klopp also wanted to buy Werner...

 

[Spiller86]

Despite Werner struggling he has been able to contribute to our attack, both Lampard and Tuchel play him even when he isn't scoring. We are among the top 5 teams when it comes to scoring goals.

Klopp also wanted to buy Werner...

I think he has definitely contributed. Just not convinced of a 60m contribution. 

On Klopp, again it's about fit. Liverpool play a style that tends to create space in behind for Salah etc. Werner works well with that. For us where we tend to be very slow in our build up so there is less space for Werner to use his pace and he has less shooting chances.

Which links back to my point about recruitment trying to just buy good potential instead of really considering how the team is trying to play. That said it's a bit challenging when we tend to totally change the direction of our style of play with every new manager we appoint...

 

[Sexyfootball]

I hope we start to focus on signing footballers who can do the basics properly, as they can pretty much play in any system the manager wants to implement

 

[bisright1]

I think he has definitely contributed. Just not convinced of a 60m contribution. 

On Klopp, again it's about fit. Liverpool play a style that tends to create space in behind for Salah etc. Werner works well with that. For us where we tend to be very slow in our build up so there is less space for Werner to use his pace and he has less shooting chances.

Which links back to my point about recruitment trying to just buy good potential instead of really considering how the team is trying to play. That said it's a bit challenging when we tend to totally change the direction of our style of play with every new manager we appoint...

That's fine, that's a valid view. I just disagree. I think Werner and Havertz fit into our style. One has not been supported by the right passes and the other has struggled to adapt to the league - but I think he will get there. 

But some people say the board should have spent 70m instead on Rice and Lampard was right. That's idiotic. No one thought that was a better signing and Lampard wanted to shove him in defence. 

 

[Luiz4Chelsea]

I think this post from half a year ago proves how ridiculous we fans can be when it comes to our assessment of the board's work. For me there's only two options here:

We either assume that we have some football knowledge, then we can't complain about how stupid a certain buy/sale was that six months earlier we celebrated the board for. We only get to realise that our judgements must have been equally clouded.

Or we assume that we have no clue about football, then we get to point out how the results prove that the club's recruitment is clearly not effective. But we DON'T get to suggest who the board should have rather signed because, once again, we have no clue.

Now that's if we're trying to be fair and honest. Instead many of us prefer to do sth more like

07/20 "come on board now go all out and sign that player, it would be absolutely insane not to!! That would finally make up for all the sloppy investment from recent seasons!!"

02/21 "yeah I know what I said, so what? Am I getting paid for this or what? If our board had only the slightest idea about football they should have realised it would have been much better to buy that other player!! Can't believe how badly run this club is!I"

 

[Stim]

We get to play with the benefit of hindsight 

 

[Spiller86]

That's fine, that's a valid view. I just disagree. I think Werner and Havertz fit into our style. One has not been supported by the right passes and the other has struggled to adapt to the league - but I think he will get there. 

But some people say the board should have spent 70m instead on Rice and Lampard was right. That's idiotic. No one thought that was a better signing and Lampard wanted to shove him in defence. 

We've been over and over this with every failed signing, if only Torres had this, if only Morata had that. Truth is when you keep making  excuses for signings by saying things need to adjust to suit them, the game is already over. We ended up buying Benayoun and signing Benitez to be the silver bullets to fix Torres. Neither made a difference.

 

[Sindre]

But some people say the board should have spent 70m instead on Rice and Lampard was right. That's idiotic.

I mean he's currently having a fantastic season for West Ham that's above us in fourth with 2/3s of the season done.

I've always maintained that we would have been far better off if we had just listened to our managers in general. The board didn't listen to Mourinho, Conte or Lampard and we would have been far better off if we did.

Most people put all the blame on Conte for the total breakdown of the relationship between him and the board but now that it happened with Lampard as well I assume that will have adjusted their opinion a bit. And then obviously Mourinho before them two as well.

 

[bisright1]

We've been over and over this with every failed signing, if only Torres had this, if only Morata had that. Truth is when you keep making  excuses for signings by saying things need to adjust to suit them, the game is already over. We ended up buying Benayoun and signing Benitez to be the silver bullets to fix Torres. Neither made a difference.

Well personally I think werner has been one of our best players since Tuchel joined. I think in his current role he is class. We just need the entire team to gel more, which hopefully Tuchel can make happen. 

I mean he's currently having a fantastic season for West Ham that's above us in fourth with 2/3s of the season done.

I've always maintained that we would have been far better off if we had just listened to our managers in general. The board didn't listen to Mourinho, Conte or Lampard and we would have been far better off if we did.

If we listened to Lampard we'd have spent 70m on Rice and he'd be our centre back next to Zouma and we wouldn't have got Silva. Rice wouldn't be having a fantastic season, he'd be learning how to be a centre back. 

Would that have made our team better?