I think appointing an attack minded Manager with a clear & defined approach to the way they play the game, will go along way in encouraging Eden to stay. That seems to be something he has always wanted. 

Granted, if we are not winning trophies and/or  challenging for the title, then that alone might not be enough. 

I just really hope he is willing to give it at least one more year and see how it goes from there. 

Even if we kept him for just one more season and then sold him, aged 28, for something in the region of £150M+ then I would think we have done pretty bloody well out of it overall. 

16 minutes ago, Ilya said:

I find this assessment a tad optimistic. He is a nice guy and isn't throwing his toys out of the pram, not publicly. And all credit to him for that.

But whatever doubts he's been having re staying at Chelsea are surely still there and will likely still be there. The club has pretty much given up on serious ambitions to win the league, never mind the Champions League. It looks like we are in for a few years of Arsenal-style attitude where getting into top 4 and getting out of the group in CL constitutes a decent season. A domestic cup once every few years to spice things up. (For the record, I'm not bitter or angry about it, I was a happy Chelsea supporter before Abramovich and if Sarri turns us into a fun team - works for me. It's OK to not be able to compete financially with City.)

Hazard is perfectly entitled to have higher ambitions. And both Real and Barca appear to be potentially in the market for a left-side attacker. And Hazard's market price will be a lot less prohibitive next summer. 

Honestly mate this is the sort of post to send me to sleep, where are the positives?, we haven't a clue what the clubs ambitions are, a bit like yourself!

15 minutes ago, Ballack & Blu said:

Honestly mate this is the sort of post to send me to sleep, where are the positives?, we haven't a clue what the clubs ambitions are, a bit like yourself!

I'm actually feeling very positive. :) I think we gonna start playing great football under Sarri and I'm really looking forward to that. I don't remember last time I looked forward to the season quite so much.

And when I say that we might lose Hazard - I don't actually think it would be the end of the world. 

As for the club's ambitions - sadly ambitions that are not backed up financially are not really ambitions, they are a fantasy. And we have clearly stopped spending. Again, I'm perfectly OK with that. This is not  some kind of an angry rant. Just an observation.

Where do you get the idea that we are going down the Arsenal road? We've signed an exciting coach (mind you, Conte was an exciting signing two years ago as well and got us competing highly) in Sarri and a competitive playmaker in Jorginho. We are definitely not interested in selling Courtois or Hazard, at least without having secured a suitable substitute, and we are keeping Kante. Barkley could be a great player this season for us, and RLC could break through and get to be the player many think he is. We just need to improve our RW and the CF. I see a competitive team here, to be honest. We have a made better moves than Arsenal, which makes me think that the Club and board is not going that route. That we can't compete with City or Liverpool in money splashing any more is not an indication of stagnation (like Spuds) or being content with EL (like Arsenal).

2 hours ago, RMH said:

Where do you get the idea that we are going down the Arsenal road? We've signed an exciting coach (mind you, Conte was an exciting signing two years ago as well and got us competing highly) in Sarri and a competitive playmaker in Jorginho. We are definitely not interested in selling Courtois or Hazard, at least without having secured a suitable substitute, and we are keeping Kante. Barkley could be a great player this season for us, and RLC could break through and get to be the player many think he is. We just need to improve our RW and the CF. I see a competitive team here, to be honest. We have a made better moves than Arsenal, which makes me think that the Club and board is not going that route. That we can't compete with City or Liverpool in money splashing any more is not an indication of stagnation (like Spuds) or being content with EL (like Arsenal).

Good post fella, CF could be a mine field for a new Striker, not struck on Higuain, but the shelves aren't loaded with quality replacements, i actually think Batman is the most natural finisher, just needs to massively increase his skillsets, Sarri could be the man to unlock what Dortmund found instantly on his brief loan out.

On 22/07/2018 at 22:33, Semper Fi said:

£350M or nothing. 

Still not enough

32 minutes ago, jack_super_class said:

Still not enough

Behave, lol

https://www.givemesport.com/1361800-maurizio-sarri-comes-up-with-new-plan-to-keep-eden-hazard-at-chelsea?autoplay=off

This article says that maybe Sarri will make Hazard the captain in order to keep him. I wouldn't mind after seeing how well he did with his national team.

8 hours ago, Ballack & Blu said:

Behave, lol

I agree with @jack_super_class £350m won't be enough to replace Hazard. If we were offered £350m or Hazard for the next 5 years, i would take Hazard. No amount of money would be good enough because we would never be able to replace him.

New coach and players to his taste, captain's badge, most likely bigger salary - he better delivers. Not that I'm yapping about it, don't get me wrong, that's the right way to treat players like him, but as I said, he better delivers.

3 hours ago, Scott Harris said:

I agree with @jack_super_class £350m won't be enough to replace Hazard. If we were offered £350m or Hazard for the next 5 years, i would take Hazard. No amount of money would be good enough because we would never be able to replace him.

So the chance of Messi, which we'd get for £350 million, wouldn't replace Eden, history begs to differ!

4 hours ago, Scott Harris said:

I agree with @jack_super_class £350m won't be enough to replace Hazard. If we were offered £350m or Hazard for the next 5 years, i would take Hazard. No amount of money would be good enough because we would never be able to replace him.

With the crap we buy why on earth are we so confident on spending that money wisely 

Edited July 28, 20187 yr by Slojo

5 hours ago, Ballack & Blu said:

So the chance of Messi, which we'd get for £350 million, wouldn't replace Eden, history begs to differ!

If Eden wanted to leave, why would Messi want to join?

2 hours ago, Kentonio said:

If Eden wanted to leave, why would Messi want to join?

Read my answer to his question, i don't do flippant answers for no reason!

8 hours ago, Slojo said:

With the crap we buy why on earth are we so confident on spending that money wisely 

I don't agree. In the last windows we've bought Morata, who was with Lukaku one of the top strikers available in the market, we've bought Kante, the best defensive midfielder there is, Barkley has a lot of potential, Bakayoko was a top player when we bought him, we've got Rudiger, top defender, Alonso, who is a very good LWB, Emerson, who has shown to be a very good player when he's got the chance. Giroud has shown to be good when we needed him. I'm sure I am missing other players, but really the average purchase was Drinkwater, and Bakayoko has been terrible last season and no one expected him to be so bad. Morata has had issues and hasn't shown the quality most people thought he had. But on average, we've made some good purchases.

1 minute ago, RMH said:

I don't agree. In the last windows we've bought Morata, who was with Lukaku one of the top strikers available in the market, we've bought Kante, the best defensive midfielder there is, Barkley has a lot of potential, Bakayoko was a top player when we bought him, we've got Rudiger, top defender, Alonso, who is a very good LWB, Emerson, who has shown to be a very good player when he's got the chance. Giroud has shown to be good when we needed him. I'm sure I am missing other players, but really the average purchase was Drinkwater, and Bakayoko has been terrible last season and no one expected him to be so bad. Morata has had issues and hasn't shown the quality most people thought he had. But on average, we've made some good purchases.

Morata was not and still is not a top striker. He was and still is a striker who has a hell of a lot to prove in his career before he get's close to being a top striker. We took a gamble on him. Kante i agree with, top signing, best we have made since Hazard. Barkley was smart thinking from the club. Bakayoko was and always has been poor. I'm not sure what we seen in him at Monaco that made us spend the money we did on him. You say nobody expected him to be so bad, but i was one of the ones saying he would be. Every time i seen him at Monaco, he looked poor. Alonso was a last minute panic buy and we got lucky, nobody, not even the people that bought him could confidently say they expected him to turn out to be as good as he has been. Emerson, it's still up in the air on if he will be a good signing or not, i liked what i seen in the games he did play though. Rudiger, yep, i agree on that one, good signing. Giroud......meh. I still don't think we really needed him and i still don't rate him much now. A good team player, but he's not really going to get us anywhere. Zappacosta and Drinkwater were just a complete waste of money. I would go as far as to say that we waster £100m last season.

If anything, this shows that we are very hit and miss, so if we got a lot of money for Hazard, i think it would be 50/50 on us spending the money on good players.

Morata was, at the time, up there with Lukaku as two strikers available considered class. There are better strikers, but none were available (and still aren't). That he hasn't lived up to the expectation is in no way a sign that Chelsea is pursuing average players. Bakayoko may not have convinced you, and I wasn't impressed the couple of matches I saw him play for Monaco (as I can't say I had seen him play more than that), but he was part of a team that made an impression in Europe and no one thought he would be as big a flop as he has been this season. Alonso was a last minute buy but the Fiorentina fans praised him a lot, and there was a lot of praise from the Italian Serie A too. So having Conte as a manager,  Zappacosta is not as bad as people say and Drinkwater has barely played for us, but I agree they can be upgraded.

But my point is, anyway, that Chelsea is not pursuing mediocrity and the board is not settling for an Arsenal set of mind as many in here say. We are trying to get, in many cases, quality players and exciting coaches, some of which have not worked out, but were a priori a good signing.

Any news on Hazard? Seems to have gone a bit quiet on the speculation front. Anyone know when he's back (if he is) training so he can see what  Sarri is all about.

2 hours ago, Kev56 said:

Any news on Hazard? Seems to have gone a bit quiet on the speculation front. Anyone know when he's back (if he is) training so he can see what  Sarri is all about.

Due back August 6th along with Michy, Courtois, Cahill. RLC has returned to training early. 

34 minutes ago, ForeverCarefree said:

Due back August 6th along with Michy, Courtois, Cahill. RLC has returned to training early. 

Presumably kante isn't due back until the 6th then either? 

15 minutes ago, big blue said:

Presumably kante isn't due back until the 6th then either? 

Maybe he gets an extra day! 

I've not seen the dates for the French lads, would assume it'll be around the same time. Apparently all players were allowed up to 3 weeks holiday after their involvement with the World Cup ended which is understandable if not ideal given how little time it gives the new manager to get across a whole new way of playing.  

33 minutes ago, ForeverCarefree said:

Maybe he gets an extra day! 

I've not seen the dates for the French lads, would assume it'll be around the same time. Apparently all players were allowed up to 3 weeks holiday after their involvement with the World Cup ended which is understandable if not ideal given how little time it gives the new manager to get across a whole new way of playing.  

The league season should've been delayed by a week in hindsight. So many big players aren't going to be match fit for at least the 1st 2 games. 

 

5 minutes ago, big blue said:

The league season should've been delayed by a week in hindsight. So many big players aren't going to be match fit for at least the 1st 2 games. 

I'm not expecting things to be settled down until after the September international break. 

Everything seems really rushed this year, especially with the shorter transfer window. 

5 minutes ago, big blue said:

The league season should've been delayed by a week in hindsight. So many big players aren't going to be match fit for at least the 1st 2 games. 

 

Yeah but it also means that the smaller teams get a bit of a boost if they play the big teams early on, could see some interesting upsets, 

16 hours ago, ForeverCarefree said:

I'm not expecting things to be settled down until after the September international break. 

Everything seems really rushed this year, especially with the shorter transfer window. 

Can you imagine the cluster f**k after Qatar