Just now, markpitts said:

Slight issue here is he is a £25m-£30m who is being paid wages of a £50m+ player. When it’s time to sell him for £30m if he turns out just OK, you will struggle to shift his wages.

Agree probably difficult but probably still doable. I'll be surprised if we pay gittens the same wages as what spuds/arse pay for kudus/Madueke or even what we give Mudryk.

Edited September 26, 2025Sep 26 by Bob stark

To anyone who doesn’t know the full force of UEFA’s punishment and how it WILL impact the club watch this, start from 33-30, it will explain how we will end up having to sell at least 2 BIG PLAYERS ( my guess Enzo and/or Palmer) could also be hit with a points deduction

Edited September 26, 2025Sep 26 by Caps_Lock_King

1 minute ago, Caps_Lock_King said:

To anyone who doesn’t know the full force of UEFA’s punishment and how it WILL impact the club watch this, start from 33-30, it will explain how we will end up having to sell at least 2 BIG PLAYERS ( my guess Enzo and/or Palmer)

Yep, the media initially undersold the gravity of the UEFA restrictions and plenty of people praising the ownership in the summer bought the Kool-Aid too. The squad cost ratio isn't the hard part, it's the specific punishment that we must break-even when it comes to player transfers in and out of a UEFA List A squad.

In simpler terms - if we want to add a player for 50m, we first need to sell a currently registered player for at least 50m beforehand.

So realistically:

• No transfers at all without selling someone in the existing UCL squad - sales of Sterling, Disasi and Jackson won't count to anything

• No big-money transfers without selling someone for big money - aka selling Palmer, Caicedo, James, Cucurella

• Chalobah, Lavia, Fofana, Fernandez, Neto could represent options for sale, but we'd have to get a decent amount

• The big one - 2 year restriction limits whether the CWC money can be leveraged at all.

• Basically a 'soft' transfer ban but that could mean a massive window in Jan 2027 or July 2028

Some speculation from Matt Law that the club can't agree on a FOS sponsor because all prospective parties have been spooked by the 74 charges

“We thought Chelsea [was] frankly an asset, a business that was not terribly well managed on the football side, sporting side or promotional side" - Behdad Eghbali, 2022

Edited September 26, 2025Sep 26 by SydneyChelsea

12 hours ago, Boyne said:

Seems the best place to post this. Earlier today I received the email below from the Chelsea Supporters Trust. All a bit of a fiasco with the distribution, selling and advertising of tickets. I'm getting more and more cynical in my old age but I think that the club is trying to force out season ticket holders especially those who have been around since the dawn of time and don't spend much money in the ground.

"Chelsea Supporters' Trust Condemns Ticket Pricing and Communication Failures for Champions League Fixtures

The Chelsea Supporters' Trust (CST) is deeply concerned with the club’s handling of ticket sales for upcoming UEFA Champions League fixtures. Recent decisions have been marked by poor communication, unjustifiable price increases, and a disregard for supporters.

The message is clear – stop exploiting our loyalty.

Poor Communication
The announcement of individual ticket sales and pricing for the Benfica match came less than 24 hours before sales began. This short notice once again highlights the club’s failure to respect the realities of life for ordinary supporters, many of whom make significant personal and financial sacrifices to attend matches.

Unjustified Price Increases
By placing the Benfica match in the AA pricing category, tickets will see a 77.5% increase for a league stage match compared to many tickets for last season’s Conference League semi-final. While the Champions League is undoubtedly a more prestigious competition than the Conference League, these sharp increases are neither justified nor sustainable.

As a result, we can reasonably assume that the club will place all knockout matches in the same AA category, regardless of opposition. This approach undermines the credibility of the category pricing system.

Removal of Concession Pricing
The AA category designation for the Champions League also removes concessions for seniors, under-20s, and under-23s in many parts of the ground – something that was never widely communicated before pricing for this match was released. This contradicts the club’s previously stated commitment to ensuring accessibility for supporters, and especially to encouraging the next generation of fans attending matches.

Wider Concerns
The lack of transparency around pricing, the rushed sales process, and the disregard for concessions paint a troubling picture of the club’s priorities. While the CST recognises that matchday revenue is reinvested into the club, we reject the idea that the revenue is coming from the right places and that it is being spent wisely – especially when it is at the expense of supporters attending matches. Looking at the latest financial records released by Chelsea from 2023/24, matchday revenue accounted for 17% of all revenue. These increases have an outsized impact on supporters and matchday atmosphere, and a minimal impact on the club, especially when taking into account that commercial revenue has not been maximised.

Decisions like these risk further alienating loyal supporters and threaten the matchday atmosphere that makes Stamford Bridge unique.

Our Call to Action
The Chelsea Supporters Trust calls on Chelsea FC to:

• Immediately review its Champions League ticket pricing strategy.

• Reinstate concession pricing across the ground for all Champions League fixtures sold on a match by match basis.

• Communicate ticket sales timelines and structures with sufficient notice and transparency.

Without urgent change, the club risks further undermining its relationship with the very supporters who are the lifeblood of Chelsea Football Club.

On behalf of Chelsea Supporters' Trust"

Thanks for posting this.

I sent an email on the 23 to the Club asking when the tickets for the Benfica game were going to be put on sale. They only came back to me on the 24th at 10 am with thi

"Please click here for the news story released for Benfica."

This is just unacceptable, to get a reply on the day that they go on sale, and to put the information about the dates the previous day, with less than 24 hours. And I checked on the 23rd the Club's site before sending my enquiry at 14:49.

3 hours ago, SydneyChelsea said:

Yep, the media initially undersold the gravity of the UEFA restrictions and plenty of people praising the ownership in the summer bought the Kool-Aid too. The squad cost ratio isn't the hard part, it's the specific punishment that we must break-even when it comes to player transfers in and out of a UEFA List A squad.

In simpler terms - if we want to add a player for 50m, we first need to sell a currently registered player for at least 50m beforehand.

So realistically:

• No transfers at all without selling someone in the existing UCL squad - sales of Sterling, Disasi and Jackson won't count to anything

• No big-money transfers without selling someone for big money - aka selling Palmer, Caicedo, James, Cucurella

• Chalobah, Lavia, Fofana, Fernandez, Neto could represent options for sale, but we'd have to get a decent amount

• The big one - 2 year restriction limits whether the CWC money can be leveraged at all.

• Basically a 'soft' transfer ban but that could mean a massive window in Jan 2027 or July 2028

Some speculation from Matt Law that the club can't agree on a FOS sponsor because all prospective parties have been spooked by the 74 charges

“We thought Chelsea [was] frankly an asset, a business that was not terribly well managed on the football side, sporting side or promotional side" - Behdad Eghbali, 2022

Club seems to be saying they have Emegha, Penders and Sarr as options to strengthen the team in Jan/summer next year which is wild. I think the sanctions mean it’s one in one out, and I don’t know how the financial angle works out.

The easy way out for the club is to sell Tyrique, Chalobah, Josh & James in the summer but there are homegrown rules to be considered also. All this could have been avoided if they didn’t scoop up every half decent young player.

19 minutes ago, markpitts said:

The easy way out for the club is to sell Tyrique, Chalobah, Josh & James in the summer but there are homegrown rules to be considered also. All this could have been avoided if they didn’t scoop up every half decent young player.

But it is good financially to keep scooping up half decent player.

In fact keeping the same team for a while is bad financially, eventually all of them want more money.

Edited September 26, 2025Sep 26 by Bob stark

28 minutes ago, markpitts said:

Club seems to be saying they have Emegha, Penders and Sarr as options to strengthen the team in Jan/summer next year which is wild. I think the sanctions mean it’s one in one out, and I don’t know how the financial angle works out.

The easy way out for the club is to sell Tyrique, Chalobah, Josh & James in the summer but there are homegrown rules to be considered also. All this could have been avoided if they didn’t scoop up every half decent young player.

Even that wouldn't solve the problem as Acheampong, George and even Lavia are registered on List B (homegrown, u-23s).

If we want to buy big, we have to sell a senior player or two.

Flog Fernandez.

Multiple problems solved !

4 minutes ago, Sexyfootball said:

Flog Fernandez.

Multiple problems solved !

Whilst ever we have underperforming players we can buy and sell, the problem comes when we have sold all the underperforming players and then move on to sell the top players.

Tbh with the theoretical quality we have in the squad even with the injuries it's surprising to me that we cant perform better on a match day. I'm beginning to think Maresca is never gonna build a strong team.

In my opinion, if we went 2 years without buying it wouldn't be the end of the world. We've got enough players and, even though some are average (GK or LW), it's ok because the board doesn't seem interested in purchasing players that immediately improve the starting line up. Bring back Penders, Paez, Sarr and Emegha and we've got more than enough players (they could even sell fringe players from the A/B list like Garnacho, Badiashille, Disasi, etc). As long as we get a proper coach, we'd be playing better and the young players would be improving, so we should get top 4.

So, in addition to stopping this merry-go-round of players, it would also stop the board from making money from their player trading policy and they'd either stop it or sell and move on to the next body to suck blood from and leave us in peace.

What was the plan this season? I read that the ownership believe we made top four a season sooner than they expected or planned. If true, then is this season another aim for top four season or if we completed the objective of top 4 a season earlier than expected, then surely this season is the season to go one better, right? What would that even look like? Because the players they've been buying doesn't compute with ambition. We could have signed Simons, but didn't. We could have signed Maignan, but didn't. We could have signed another decent CB, we didn't. The left side seems to be lacking unless Garnacho and/or Gittens prove to be good enough. We are still lacking in areas to truly challenge for big trophies. Is the aim this season to win another cup, maybe the FA Cup?

Ultimately, the root of all issues within this football club.

3 seasons in a row by the way with no front of the shirt sponsor.

8 hours ago, SydneyChelsea said:

Yep, the media initially undersold the gravity of the UEFA restrictions and plenty of people praising the ownership in the summer bought the Kool-Aid too. The squad cost ratio isn't the hard part, it's the specific punishment that we must break-even when it comes to player transfers in and out of a UEFA List A squad.

In simpler terms - if we want to add a player for 50m, we first need to sell a currently registered player for at least 50m beforehand.

So realistically:

• No transfers at all without selling someone in the existing UCL squad - sales of Sterling, Disasi and Jackson won't count to anything

• No big-money transfers without selling someone for big money - aka selling Palmer, Caicedo, James, Cucurella

• Chalobah, Lavia, Fofana, Fernandez, Neto could represent options for sale, but we'd have to get a decent amount

• The big one - 2 year restriction limits whether the CWC money can be leveraged at all.

• Basically a 'soft' transfer ban but that could mean a massive window in Jan 2027 or July 2028

Some speculation from Matt Law that the club can't agree on a FOS sponsor because all prospective parties have been spooked by the 74 charges

“We thought Chelsea [was] frankly an asset, a business that was not terribly well managed on the football side, sporting side or promotional side" - Behdad Eghbali, 2022

I doubt we will be seeing big signings of established players under the current owners. It will be more along the lines of the Madueke/Gittens situation where we offload one of our young players and bring in somebody unproven for a similar price.

15 hours ago, Sunspear_88 said:

What was the plan this season? I read that the ownership believe we made top four a season sooner than they expected or planned. If true, then is this season another aim for top four season or if we completed the objective of top 4 a season earlier than expected, then surely this season is the season to go one better, right? What would that even look like? Because the players they've been buying doesn't compute with ambition. We could have signed Simons, but didn't. We could have signed Maignan, but didn't. We could have signed another decent CB, we didn't. The left side seems to be lacking unless Garnacho and/or Gittens prove to be good enough. We are still lacking in areas to truly challenge for big trophies. Is the aim this season to win another cup, maybe the FA Cup?

This is the plan.

You won't even consider moving Jackson unless you will get Isak or at least Ekitike.

You won't even consider selling Madueke unless you get an olise.

There is simply nothing positive about this club. The ownership have made wrong decision after wrong decision, can't even get a shirt sponser after 18 f**king months. The sporting directors have signed billions of pounds of sh*t players. The players and management are tactically inept, mentally weak, with no football IQ making stupid mistakes over and over. I am just so f**king sick of it. And it's all so predictable. You know what's going to happen within 5 minutes of every game. This will be Potter-esque by the end of the season and we'll be lucky to finish top 10.

These geniuses are supposed to be good at business then huh?? Absolute bums.. even the Saudis seemed to be doing a better job than these clowns.. fck off you frauds .. running the club to the ground.. we were told we were getting a sports franchise owner in boehly.. at least he tried.. egbahly and winstanley are the disease that is affecting the club.. the olise transfer was the first indication.. these fcks bought gittens and garnqcho for 100 mil and let etikete go .. fck off you frauds ..

This lot give me a migraine. My blood pressure rises to unhealthy levels watching this damn team. They've come in, torn everything up and contributed to our regression. We just about made top 4 last season and won a trophy that West Ham were able to win. CWC was a nice trophy to win, but it's meaningless now in the grand scheme of things.

Keep reading that all they are interested in is profit, but so much of their behaviour to date has been flat out harmful to even that lowly objective ...

What company interested in the bottom line leaves £60-100m of shirt sponsorship on the table over 3 years ?

I conclude they are just idiots LOL.

I just don't understand it. If you hire random people from the street and give them 2B to spend on players, I doubt they would do worse than our directors have. How have we managed to put ourselves in this situation, where we need to continuously spend boatloads every window because the team isn't getting any better? It boggles the mind.

It is no coincidence our off the pitch issues, challenges and just mis-management make their way onto the pitch.

I've backed the owners and board as much as anyone, but my patience is out and they're killing the connection to the club with the erosion of any standards. I'm tired of us always being in the crosshairs of the FA, PL and UEFA - its exhausting and a distraction. The staff the owners have employed are not progressing the club, simple as.

• What role does a commercial director have if we've spent 3 years without a shirt sponsor

• How inept are the recruitment team if we've spent $1.5B yet we still need a GK, CB, LW and CF. How is it acceptable that after all that our defenders ended up being an academy grad and Hato, a new signing

• How inept are the medical staff in player conditioning, treatment and overall fitness. We succumb to more injuries than any other club

We are the circus on Kings Road, and a laughing stock. Restore some damn pride - sick of the lot of them.

Their cunning plan isn’t working, as expected. They’re a bunch of clowns and the sooner we get rid of them, the better. What a sh*t show.

Edited September 27, 2025Sep 27 by RMH

Maresca isn't covering himself with glory but the main problem is the recruitment.

Why did we stack our squad with a number of young inexperienced players again this season? Why are we still doing this with the arrival of Emegha next year?

I thought the plan was to watch a team of 20 year olds grow together. Turns out the plan is to perpetually have a team 20 year olds.

Edited September 27, 2025Sep 27 by yaz

7 minutes ago, yaz said:

Maresca isn't covering himself with glory but the main problem is the recruitment.

Why did we stack our squad with a number of young inexperienced players again this season? Why are we still doing this with the arrival of Emegha next year?

I thought the plan was to watch a team of 20 year olds grow together. Turns out the plan is to perpetually have a team 20 year olds.

The main problem is not recruitment. I do not believe that a team with Pedro, Palmer, Estevao, Neto, Gittens, Caicedo, Enzo, Santos, Cucu, Hato etc is as bad as this. We have lots of good players. Perhaps not elite at the moment, but pretty bloody good.... but they are not allowed to play. They play scared, because the slow and boring way the fraud makes them play.

7 minutes ago, nonotnowjim said:

The main problem is not recruitment. I do not believe that a team with Pedro, Palmer, Estevao, Neto, Gittens, Caicedo, Enzo, Santos, Cucu, Hato etc is as bad as this. We have lots of good players. Perhaps not elite at the moment, but pretty bloody good.... but they are not allowed to play. They play scared, because the slow and boring way the fraud makes them play.

Recruitment is sh*t. Sorry but the team is full of average players. Should the team be playing better? Sure, but recruitment is a huge problem when all they want is players with low wages. The board and SDs are sh*t and should go the sooner the better.

3 minutes ago, RMH said:

Recruitment is sh*t. Sorry but the team is full of average players. Should the team be playing better? Sure, but recruitment is a huge problem when all they want is players with low wages. The board and SDs are sh*t and should go the sooner the better.

Reece. Not Average.

Caicedo. Not Average.

Palmer. Not Average.

Cucu. Not Average.

Enzo. Debateable - but I think still better than average.

J. Pedro. Not Average.

Estavao. Not Average.

Then you have a case of other supporting players. Santos. Neto. Gittens. Colwill. Delap. Fofana. Lavia. Hato. etc....all players that are decent supporting acts.

The issue comes when we dont play to any of their strengths.