those aren't supposed to be first team players though. i am not sure what players he expects or wants, but the reason city got their targets is because they were much easier to acquire and they wanted the move for various reasons. asking our board for nainggolan, koulibaly, sandro, bonucci, vidal isn't at all realistic at that given time. just because we are chelsea doesn't allow us a god given right to a player. we don't like it when clubs come in for our top players, but when we do the same and get turned down some of our fans point to the board and call them useless or have zero ambition.

Edited March 2, 20188 yr by enigma

IMO it certainly looks and feels that Conte has already made his mind up to leave, and unfortunately with the way the players are being undermined we can say goodbye to top 4. I sincerely hope we don't lose Conte and top 4 spot, but there seems to be a bit of unrest with quite a few players.

40 minutes ago, charierre said:

finished 2nd? can't do much better

Like you said, awful season all round in the prem. The Champions won 5 away games all season and even Moyes's United would have got enough points for top four.

13 minutes ago, Osgood is Good said:

IMO it certainly looks and feels that Conte has already made his mind up to leave, and unfortunately with the way the players are being undermined we can say goodbye to top 4. I sincerely hope we don't lose Conte and top 4 spot, but there seems to be a bit of unrest with quite a few players.

I don't see the unrest to be honest. The players still seem to be behind him. We are just about good enough to make top 4 in my mind. Below that, it will be on Conte but the guy has been handicapped from the very start. Good way to reward him after winning the title at a canter. 

11 minutes ago, JoseBlues said:

I don't see the unrest to be honest. The players still seem to be behind him. We are just about good enough to make top 4 in my mind. Below that, it will be on Conte but the guy has been handicapped from the very start. Good way to reward him after winning the title at a canter. 

I'd question whether some of the players are giving 100% especially looking back at the Bournemouth and Watford results. I don't think that Luiz, Courtois, Morata, are happy and are giving everything. Just my thoughts though

41 minutes ago, enigma said:

those aren't supposed to be first team players though. i am not sure what players he expects or wants, but the reason city got their targets is because they were much easier to acquire and they wanted the move for various reasons. asking our board for nainggolan, koulibaly, sandro, bonucci, vidal isn't at all realistic at that given time. just because we are chelsea doesn't allow us a god given right to a player. we don't like it when clubs come in for our top players, but when we do the same and get turned down some of our fans point to the board and call them useless or have zero ambition.

Why did we sign them then? What's the point in signing players that don't improve the first team? 

Zappacosta, Palmieri, Giroud and Bakayoko. Are these first team signings? That's 75% of our signings this season. None of which are in any way an improvement on the first team.

All signings should be made with the idea of improving the first team. You don't buy squad players, you buy the best that you can and the current players either match them or become squad players themselves. None of our transfers (Bar Morata and Rudiger) were bought with that intention.  None of them are good enough to start for Chelsea and they all show the lack of ambition at the club. 

Also, there is a large chasm between Vidal/Sandro and Drinkwater/Zappacosta. We failed and actively weakened the side as a result.

Just now, Total-Football said:

Why did we sign them then? What's the point in signing players that don't improve the first team? 

Because our board are not willing to spend the money required to sign top players these days, they'd much rather go for quantity over quality.

6 minutes ago, Zeta said:

Because our board are not willing to spend the money required to sign top players these days, they'd much rather go for quantity over quality.

we had to prioritize depth this summer and for as poor overall as the signings have been, we have the deepest squad we have had for years. This summer is where there be no excuse not to sign top quality.

32 minutes ago, JoseBlues said:

I don't see the unrest to be honest. The players still seem to be behind him. We are just about good enough to make top 4 in my mind. Below that, it will be on Conte but the guy has been handicapped from the very start. Good way to reward him after winning the title at a canter. 

You can't blame him for not retaining the title, but if we fall out of top four  then it's largely on him.

10 minutes ago, Zeta said:

Because our board are not willing to spend the money required to sign top players these days, they'd much rather go for quantity over quality.

We still spend the same amount though just on worse players.

I have being a Chelsea fan since the Zola and Vialli days. Its sad to see that we have made no improvements on personnel the past couple of seasons especially but I am even more saddened to see the pesimisim of our own fans. Before Conte We asked for manager to offer us some stability after finishing 10th, (he eon us premier league)play a few youngsters (Christiansen regular, next year no doubt one more will break through in ampadu or Odoi). We ask for patience from the board yet we are not patient yourselves. We bought palmieri a Roma reserve after a major injury. Barkley injured lack of fitness that won't see full potential until next season. Giroud which i like but an Arsenal reserve player, yet we expect Conte to do miracles with these players. Who do we expect to take over from Conte? Do we really think we will do better? Do you really think he will give time to youth knowing fully well if he doesn't deliver immediately he is gone! 

1 hour ago, Total-Football said:

Why did we sign them then? What's the point in signing players that don't improve the first team? 

Zappacosta, Palmieri, Giroud and Bakayoko. Are these first team signings? That's 75% of our signings this season. None of which are in any way an improvement on the first team.

All signings should be made with the idea of improving the first team. You don't buy squad players, you buy the best that you can and the current players either match them or become squad players themselves. None of our transfers (Bar Morata and Rudiger) were bought with that intention.  None of them are good enough to start for Chelsea and they all show the lack of ambition at the club. 

Also, there is a large chasm between Vidal/Sandro and Drinkwater/Zappacosta. We failed and actively weakened the side as a result.

Bang on the money there, the squad improves with quality not quantity. Either buy the best you can or ones that are young and likely to show significant improvement and bulk your squad out with our own young hopefuls. We've had a scattergun approach to recruitment this year and it shows.

14 minutes ago, Zeta said:

Because our board are not willing to spend the money required to sign top players these days, they'd much rather go for quantity over quality.

How many of those players wanted to sign for us or indicated in any way they were willing to force a move despite having a former manager or offering more money to them? 

Radja isn't leaving Rome and has said as much. How would you have convinced him?

Lukaku straight up chose another club over us. Danilo as well. 

Sandro didn't want to leave Juve, used our interest to try for a new deal and didn't get it. Juve wasn't exactly interested in selling him either despite the huge amount of money on offer.

Kouli used interest for a new contract. Napoli wasn't interested in selling him. How would you have swung that?

Bonucci refused to leave Italy. How would you have convinced him?

 

This narrative of the board not spending money is silly. Yea they didn't buy top players but all the top players we clearly targeted were not interested. Now Conte shares some blame for that because many of them already have a relationship with him or are well familiar with him so he should be pulling players in unless they really aren't interested in playing for him. Blame the board for selling Matic yes, but then you also have to give them credit for buying Rudi.  

The idea that the players city bought were "interested" while the ones we targeted weren't is quite simply rubbish. Every player has a price.

Even if one does not get it's target, You get someone close to the target. Am sorry but zappacosta with Sandro is a huge difference. We couldn't even close a deal for Llorente for goodness sake. Lol

Even if one does not get it's target, You get someone close to the target. Am sorry but zappacosta with Sandro is a huge difference. We couldn't even close a deal for Llorente for goodness sake. Lol

Who wants Llorente? Giroud is way better imho.

7 minutes ago, EmeraldBlue said:

33 minutes ago, Gentian said:

Even if one does not get it's target, You get someone close to the target. Am sorry but zappacosta with Sandro is a huge difference. We couldn't even close a deal for Llorente for goodness sake. Lol

Who wants Llorente? Giroud is way better imho.

Llorente looks very poor for Spurs, and he was a "Conte target". I'm in the Conte camp, so to speak, however he shouldn't be moaning about the quality we bought, when you look at how one of his targets, Llorente, has performed.

3 hours ago, Argo said:

Like you said, awful season all round in the prem. The Champions won 5 away games all season and even Moyes's United would have got enough points for top four.

So is there anyone who you think was unjustly sacked by our board? 

24 minutes ago, Osgood is Good said:

Llorente looks very poor for Spurs, and he was a "Conte target". I'm in the Conte camp, so to speak, however he shouldn't be moaning about the quality we bought, when you look at how one of his targets, Llorente, has performed.

I agree. Also, Giroud is 2 years younger. However, point is that we have a huge problem closing deals the last couple of years and we can't blame emenealo anymore so who is doing these negotiations. 

3 minutes ago, Slojo said:

So is there anyone who you think was unjustly sacked by our board? 

You could argue Ranieri but at the same time we just couldn't pass on Jose. Ten Cate  (im convinced he was our manager in 2008 in all but name and Avram's record since has done nothing to change my mind). Jose mark 1 i felt so at the time, i assumed he would have turned it round because he was Mourinho but with his later evidence im not sure he would have. In hindsight Jose should have left in summer 2007 and Carlo replaced him for 3 years, it would have been the best solution for Chelsea, Jose, Carlo and Milan.

The main way the board f**ked up was with some of the appointments Scolari, RDM (full time) should never have got the job, AVB was too early although part of me would be curious to see him now (the version straight from Porto that is, he's too damaged as a manager now his ill fated spell with us turned him scared and cautious tactically) as our current defense and keeper could pull off his high line, and you could even argue Jose mark 2 was a misguided appointment despite the title purely because we were building towards an identity alien to him.

The fact that they are willing to rectify those errors quickly instead of prolonging the agony (Wenger Arsenal, LVG United) for me is excellent. 

Llorente looks very poor for Spurs, and he was a "Conte target". I'm in the Conte camp, so to speak, however he shouldn't be moaning about the quality we bought, when you look at how one of his targets, Llorente, has performed.

Conte turned Moses into a good WB. If Conte wanted him, I trust him to get the beat out of Llorente.

1 hour ago, JoseBlues said:

The idea that the players city bought were "interested" while the ones we targeted weren't is quite simply rubbish. Every player has a price.

Right, money has everything to do with it. Matic only wanted to leave for United for the money. Sandro wanted to stay at Juve because he would get more pay there, same for Koulibaly. Napoli have such a great wage scale. Get real, they aren't living in a vacuum where everything is the same except for pay. You think Spurs offered more pay to Llorente? 

The players City bought were available and willing to leave. No amount of money was making Bonucci leave Italy. Nianggolan didn't want to leave either. 

Quote

"I could have gone to Chelsea and many other clubs, but starting something knew when you are 28, 29, in a new culture, another lifestyle, that's not for me," he told Belgium's Sport Voetbal Magazine. "I prefer to stay where I feel good."

1

What a greedy guy, can't believe the board wouldn't just pay him the money he demanded. 

3 hours ago, Total-Football said:

Why did we sign them then? What's the point in signing players that don't improve the first team? 

Zappacosta, Palmieri, Giroud and Bakayoko. Are these first team signings? That's 75% of our signings this season. None of which are in any way an improvement on the first team.

All signings should be made with the idea of improving the first team. You don't buy squad players, you buy the best that you can and the current players either match them or become squad players themselves. None of our transfers (Bar Morata and Rudiger) were bought with that intention.  None of them are good enough to start for Chelsea and they all show the lack of ambition at the club. 

Also, there is a large chasm between Vidal/Sandro and Drinkwater/Zappacosta. We failed and actively weakened the side as a result.

It kind of feels like going around in circles repeating it often. We needed depth but also, how do we upgrade on a first team which won the league? Costa left, nothing we could do there. We either replaced him with Morata or lukaku.

Matic was probably the other loss from the first team. Apart from that did anybody really foresee certain players would regress? Hindsight is a wonderful  thing. 

How do you replace a first team which won the league so well the year previous? The club were pursuing Sandro,  but juventus were unwilling to let him leave.

We were after nainggolan but we couldn't get him. Other players we were after either didn't want to come or were not allowed to leave.

People were asking for depth, now we have got it. The club didn't fail for any other reason than their top targets being unattainable. We then turned to the plan b targets. Not much the board can do in this situation. 

Edited March 2, 20188 yr by enigma

What a greedy guy, can't believe the board wouldn't just pay him the money he demanded. 

As the joker says "If you are good at something, never do it for free". I won't call it greed.

53 minutes ago, JoseBlues said:

1 hour ago, TheChelseaBlues said:

What a greedy guy, can't believe the board wouldn't just pay him the money he demanded. 

As the joker says "If you are good at something, never do it for free". I won't call it greed.

He's already not doing it for free. He chose less money to stay in a comfortable situation which is the entire point. 

He's already not doing it for free. He chose less money to stay in a comfortable situation which is the entire point. 

No. He or his club had a number in their mind. For some reason, we try to haggle below that number. Sometimes we just have to meet them if we are really serious.