Most the ones leaving are the ones with lower ceilings than we currently have. We're not selling players like Broja, Gilmour, Colwill and Maatsen are we? Its just the likes of Simeu, Tomori, Guehi who have less of a ceiling than who we currently have. Worst case scenario they turn into good players, and we buy them back cheap because of buyback clauses, but I dont think they'll be anywhere near as good as some of you think.

Saying that I do think Bate and Livramento were 2 we should have maybe kept and loaned out, but im okay with the rest.

It was bound to happen. We can't keep every single one of them, it'll harm their careers a la Piazon

Today Tammy ventured to pastures new, good luck to him. It does though shows our academy is now working to its full potential. Yes it would be nice to have a team full of young graduates and who knows someday it may happen. Last weekend there was only two fixtures in the Premier League that didn't include a Chelsea graduate, it would have been one if Bertrand had been fit. That in itself is phenomenal and is testament to the investment and hard work by Neil Bath and his coaching team. It will also put us up top of the tree when a young player is deciding which academy to join, Chelsea graduates who are talented and work hard at their trade are now a commodity that is coveted by teams around Europe in a similar way to how Barcelona youngsters were 10 years ago. Long gone are the days when our club are the 'but' of jokes, the top players we now develop for our first team whilst supplying a steady stream of youth for the good of football and not to mention our healthy bank balance.    

An article about our academy players and where they end up (I'm also going to post this in the Frank Lampard thread)

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2021/nov/27/chelsea-cobham-youth-academy-colonising-premier-league

6 hours ago, Valerie said:

An article about our academy players and where they end up (I'm also going to post this in the Frank Lampard thread)

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2021/nov/27/chelsea-cobham-youth-academy-colonising-premier-league

didn't know Jóhann Berg Gudmundsson was a chelsea youth

On 21/07/2021 at 16:12, ducavis said:

They would do what we should have done with Lamptey & James; play the more attacking one at FB/WB, and the more defensive one as a 3rd CB in a back 3/DM.

This is what we did with Tariq & Reece in the 2017/18 Quadruple winning U18s. Best U18 side I've ever seen.