Conte's Chelsea - the shape of 'fings' to come?

According to Spurs chairman Daniel Levy, the current astronomic rise in transfer fees worldwide is 'unsustainable' and he's not going to play ball when it comes to paying through the nose, though he is quite happy to participate in the bidding process and reserves the right to hop on the bandwagon just long enough to trouser £54m for a suitably sustainable Kyle Walker. Presumably he will now lie low for a while, refrain from mocking those afflicted with buy-at-any-price-itis, before rising like a Phoenix and striking when the market collapses to get Neymar in for a mere pittance. Of course, that wont happen and we, like Levy, are deluding ourselves if we think it will. Indeed, our very own Antonio recently spoke to Martyn Ziegler (The Times) on this subject and, unlike Levy and translating his opening remarks into full fifties Lionel Bart broad cockney, he readily accepted that fings ain't what they used to be. He then went on to say the following:-

“Every team has to understand what their ambitions are. If their ambitions are to win or fight for the title or try to win the Champions League, you must buy expensive players. Otherwise you continue to stay in your level. It’s simple.”

Get the message Daniel? Forget the subsequently headline-grabbing comment about forking out £100m for Harry Kane, dismiss the praise lavished on the quality squad that Potchettino has at his disposal, it's all secondary to the Italian's unsubtle put down. In short, if Spurs don't end up participating on both sides of this big bucks bonanza they reveal a singular lack ambition and by ramming home the point [that Levy was quite happy to drink up the Walker draft while not being prepared to stand his round when it came to his turn to pay] Conte made it abundantly clear where he stood on the matter. Moreover, he went on to say it was “a miracle” Chelsea, and before them Leicester City, were able to win the Premier League due to the size of their squads and now that Chelsea are back in the Champions League it is a different ball game [because] to bring in four or five “average” or “normal” players would still cost the club £200 million.

But much more importantly, Antonio's conversation with Ziegler confirmed his intention to continue spending at the top end of the market, no expense spared, rather than make compromises, and this leads me [somewhat belatedly I know] to the main point of this post, which is to suggest that we now have a very good idea of how Conte envisages the make-up of his squad given the unfair crack of the whip, otherwise known as financial clout, he has at his disposal - a mixture of expensive top quality imports, bolstered by development squad players at a certain level who provide cover in the short term that never manifests itself into potentially disruptive claims for more, unless excellence is shown when performing that role. In his interview Conte was equally as revealing on this particular aspect too:-

“Sometimes young players lose their patience very quickly, a lot of the time because of parents or the people around them. Trust the club, work very hard because to play at this level you must be stronger and very good. Sometimes young players think that they can play easily in the first team but that’s not true.”

Bearing this in mind, it is interesting to look at the emerging talent taken to China with those currently in a first team squad that could be down to just 19 players if, as anticipated, Costa, Matic, Remy [perhaps Kenedy] move on. This would leave us with a pool of 25 players, to which will be added a further 3 or 4, should Conte get his way. If press reports are to be believed, the positions Conte wants to strengthen are both FB/WB positions, another CM and a front man. Working on the principle that he will require two players for each position [plus three keepers] and that this will necessitate specialists for both 3-5-2 and 3-4-3 formations (6 CBs and 4WBs) the existing group plus new players and anticipated signings could be paired off as follows:-

GKs - Thibaut Courtois, Willy Caballero, Eduardo,

CBs - Gary Cahill/Jake Clarke-Salter, David Luiz/Andreas Christensen, Antonio Rudiger/Fikayo Tomori

FB/WBs - Cesar Azpilicueta/Victor Moses/?Marcos Alonso/?

CMs - Cesc Fabregas/Mario Pasalic, N'Golo Kante/Kyle Scott, Tiemoue Bakayoko/Jeremie Boga

WMs – Willian, Pedro Edin Hazard/Charly Musonda Jr

CFs - Alvaro Morata, Michy Batshuayi

The blotting of Kenedy's far from copybook start to a Chelsea career means that he is unlikely to challenge Alonso and that makes it an even more massive question mark to set beside Marcos name, but whoever the player bought turns out to be the odds are he's going to fit the 'expensive' template Conte referred to above. The right side requirement seems not so pressing and in China we have seen the boss give Tomori an opportunity to stake a claim here. He did well against Bayern, but whether it is enough to make Conte think twice about splashing out on a more 'expensive recruit (a Kyle Walker clone anyone?) well, your guess is as good as mine.

Likewise with any additional purchase made in the CM position, where we are said to be interested in taking the 19yr-old Renato Sanches on loan. To my mind, in view of how little of it there would be, we would be better off giving the game time he would get to Lewis Baker, Jeremie Boga, Kyle Scott or Mario Pasalic, rather than let Bayern play our loan game against us in what is bound to be a contractually restricted period geared towards ensuring Sanches couldn't hurt them in the Champions League. Okay, Sanches has had more big game experience than our three, two of whom [Baker and Pasalic] are already three years older, but it really would be ironic if we ended up with him in our ranks, playing a handful of games before toddling off back to Germany, while our two 19 and 20yr-olds looked on from the bench, or even further afield.

And so, at last, we've reached the heart of this matter, the tipping point you might say between Daniel Levy's short-arms, deep-pockets approach and Antonio's buy and fight, simple but costly, two-step guide to ambition fulfilment. The fulcrum is, of course, Roman Abramovich, major benefactor of this parish and holder of the purse strings. The next few weeks will tell us which way and exactly how far he is prepared to lean in order to sway the balance in our favour and against the financial wind of change that's blowing through the Premier League. We've already changed a hell of a lot, full scale from local Palais into bowling alley, onwards and upwards, with cathedral high expectations over the next few years - how much more can we expect from the man?