Bob Singleton

So Caicedo pretty much done; fees agreed, personal terms agreed, medical passed. Just contract to sign and official announcement. Lavia looks sorted as fee agreed with Southampton, personal terms agreed a while back and the player has made it known that his preference is Chelsea over Liverpool Olise also looks close to done. Fee very close to being agreed. Personal terms already agreed. Daiveid Washington on a flight to London for a medical prior to completing his transfer from Santos. Apparently one senior member of Santos' management team has resigned because we've got him for half of his €30m release clause. Just a 'keeper to sort out, then.

Hopefully it won't be too long before he starts adding goals to these impressive stats. Nice to have a striker who works his socks off for the team again.

Regarding Tyler Adams... A few sources are suggesting that pulling out of the deal had nothing to do with 'saving' the £20m it would have cost to buy him to put toward an increased bid for Caicedo. Rather it was because his medical showed that it could take another 3 to 4 months for him to recover from his hamstring injury.

Regarding Financial Fair Play... It is NOT a case of "if you spend £600m on players, you need to sell £600m worth of players" FFP is based on ALL income and ALL expenditure. UEFA and PL/FA have slightly different rules and different ways of looking at the accounts, but both look at all income streams and all expenditure. Some expenditure can be written off, some can under special circumstances, and some just can't. FFP is also based on three year rolling periods, allows for amortisation, and both UEFA and the PL/FA allow clubs to spend slightly more (in the case of the PL it's a measly £5m I think) than they make. Whilst player purchases and sales (plus player salaries) make up the "big numbers", match day revenue (ticket sales, catering etc) and sponsorship are also important. It was recently reported that the club were looking for more investment... some £500 million It was suggested that this extra investment would be 'earmarked' for future stadium development. That may well be so. From an FFP perspective, however, it matters not if this extra money - should we get it - is 'earmarked' for stadium development or not. It goes in the 'income' column. That's all that matters. Additionally, it is clear that our new owners are using their knowledge of sports sponsorship acquired over many years of running US sports franchises and bringing that to Stamford Bridge. It's early days yet - and our latest potential sponsor is awaiting the OK of the PL/FA - but the signs are that they are capable of finding potential sponsors from business sectors not previously involved in football.

One saying done, one saying almost done.

Latest rumours... Brighton will ONLY sell Caicedo to Liverpool and will reject any other offers. B&HA claim that they were very clear that midnight last night was the deadline for bids and they would accept the highest bid that reached or went beyond their minimum threshold. Liverpool bid £110/£111 million (take your pick depending on source) which was accepted. Chelsea bid £100m & Bayern Munich £90m. Those bids were rejected. Caicedo has told both Liverpool and B&HA that he only wants to move to Chelsea. It was reported by one source that he cleared his locker the other day and had booked into a plush London hotel. In his press conference earlier today, de Zerbi said “I’ve already forgotten Moises.” One or more parties are going to have to back down.

For those too lazy to bother reading the whole article, the following may be relevant: "Given that Tempus Ex Machina’s annual turnover was estimated at $15.4m (just over £12m) questions have already been asked outside Chelsea about where the funding for a sponsorship deal worth more than £40m a year would come from." https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2023/08/09/chelsea-shirt-sponsorship-deal-value-infinity-management/ Premier League will decide on value of Chelsea's shirt sponsorship By Matt Law, Football News Correspondent 4–5 minutes The final value of Chelsea’s proposed sponsorship with start-up company Infinite Management will be governed by the Premier League’s fair market value rules. Infinite Management have put forward a deal to become the club’s main front-of-shirt sponsor, which one report claimed would be worth more than the £40 million-a-year paid by Three. Chelsea are yet to confirm or comment on the proposed deal, which has raised some eyebrows given that the formation of Infinite Management was only announced this month and the new firm has investment links to the Chelsea owners, Clearlake Capital and Todd Boehly. Tempus Ex Machina, with whom Chelsea signed a seven-year product partnership in April, acquired Biocore to form Infinite Management, whose partners include Silver Lake. Silver Lake own more than 18 per cent of the City Football Group and are investors in Fanatics, along with Eldridge, which is the company owned by Boehly. Clearlake Capital led a $700m financing round for Fanatics last year. Given that Tempus Ex Machina’s annual turnover was estimated at $15.4m (just over £12m) questions have already been asked outside Chelsea about where the funding for a sponsorship deal worth more than £40m a year would come from. Chris Jurasek, Chelsea’s new chief executive officer who is also an operating executive at Clearlake Capital, was put in charge of the club’s search for a new sponsor and has held talks with a number of companies. Sources claim there are other options apart from Infinite Management. Chelsea have not qualified for the Champions League, which has presented a challenge in finding a new sponsor at a similar financial level to Three. A proposed deal with Paramount was blocked by the Premier League, while Chelsea pulled out of advanced negotiations with online casino Stake. With the top-flight season starting this weekend, some experts had predicted that the club might struggle to raise more than £25million a year at such a late stage. Newcastle United, who have qualified for the Champions League, this summer signed a new £25m-a-year sponsorship deal with Saudi Arabia events company Sela that passed the Premier League’s fair market value rules. Under Premier League rules, major commercial deals must be agreed at “fair market value” with an assessment undertaken by an independent expert. Although a deal cannot technically be stopped, clubs can be forced to renegotiate if they are not deemed to be consistent with market prices. For each fair market value assessment, the Premier League considers submissions from the relevant club, the assessment of the independent expert and comparable data from within the league. Clubs are able to announce sponsorship deals before the fair market value assessment has been completed, but can only take money from the deal once the league has given their green light.

Not sure having a porn site as a shirt sponsor is a good idea. I'm sure Boehly & Co will reject all such advances. https://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/chelsea-shirt-sponsor-who-why-30649311

Regarding red kits, CFC has a very long history of having red second/third choice shirts. I remember seeing us play in red in the 70s an 80s. I'm surprised some of those of my generation or older don't recall us playing in red. https://www.footballkitarchive.com/chelsea-fc-kits/

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2023/08/04/manchester-united-takeover-potential-investor-chelsea/ Man United takeover: Potential investor switches attention to Chelsea By Tom Morgan, Sports News Correspondent 2–3 minutes One of the US-based investment firms offering fresh investment at Manchester United earlier this year is now eyeing a potential deal at Chelsea. Ares Management is believed to be in talks about offering investment at Stamford Bridge, with the Todd Boehly-led consortium open to receiving a capital injection. The investment firm is becoming a major player in the sector, having last year raised $3.7 billion (£3.2 billion) to invest in sports, media and entertainment, more than twice the $1.5 billion originally targeted. It emerged in March that Ares were among a clutch of US firms offering funding for United as the Glazers explored a still unresolved sale of the club. On Friday, a report on the Bloomberg newswire, and subsequently verified by Telegraph Sport, detailed how the firm is discussing making an offer for a deal at Stamford Bridge. Ares and Chelsea declined to comment. A source told Telegraph Sport that the club is approached by investors regularly. The preference for Boehly and Clearlake is understood to be an equity investment, but there is no certainty the club will agree on a deal. If any deal was ever agreed, it would be directed towards “growth prospects” including a new stadium project and the multi-club model. In recent days Ares confirmed it had put an extra $75 million (£58.8 million) into David Beckham’s Inter Miami CF following the arrival of Lionel Messi. Other investments include Atletico Madrid and Eagle Football Holdings, a multi-club owner that backs Crystal Palace and Olympique Lyonnais. Clearlake Capital and Boehly have spent more than £600 million on new players since completing their purchase of the club from Roman Abramovich last May. There has been a feeding frenzy for English football within the US investment sector in recent years, with around half of Premier League teams and at least 13 of the remaining 72 EFL clubs having significant American backing. On Thursday, Tom Brady, the five-time Super Bowl MVP quarterback, was announced as a minority owner at Birmingham City.

Thanks for that post @martin1905 I'm heartily sick and tired of the Neanderthals in this group whose knee jerk reaction to everything mental-health related is that people should just 'man up'

Correct... we paid Barca £12m/€15m Edit: https://www.standard.co.uk/sport/football/chelsea-fc-aubameyang-transfer-confirmed-2022-b1022405.html

More bouffant than flowing, I would say. Saw him play a few times, but mainly - as a kid - I remember he was one of the easiest players to pick out from a distance when Chelsea used to train half a mile or so from where I lived in 1971

Personally - and there are rumours he may be available given a) Jude Bellingham has been signed and b) they may need to go for Mbappé now rather than wait a year - I'd rather go for Tchouaméni over Caicedo. Firstly he's a proper holding/defensive midfielder (Caicedo plays more like Kanté, roaming all over the pitch, sometimes leaving potential holes behind him that the opposition can exploit). Secondly, he has greater experience overall (especially in the CL) and last but certainly not least, I'd rather give money to Real Madrid than Brighton... they've squeezed enough out of us as it is! (Not forgetting what I consider a derisory and disrespectful offer for Colwill) Cherki is 100% yess Vlahovic is a 75% yes Having said all of the above, and trying to not be too fussy, if those are the final pieces of the jigsaw for the coming season, I wouldn't be unhappy.

One could argue that we had 'experience' last season, and look where that got us? Don't get me wrong, I'm not suggesting that experience isn't important, but a lot of those 'experienced' players didn't seem invested in the club. That so many have now left (and without too much difficulty in moving them on) suggests that having players that actually want to be at the club might just trump 'experience'. Anyway, it's not as if we're completely devoid of 'experience'; we still have - love them or loathe them - Kepa, James, Chilwell, Silva and Sterling as senior pros with trophies to their names.

Similar pieces in the Telegraph, Guardian and DM (probably elsewhere too)

Actually, politics is allowed on this forum... so long as it's the right sort of politics. What gets you told off is calling it out!

@thevelourfog And let's not forget that it wasn't all that long ago that one of the founders of Stake dot com was suing the other two founders for $500m+. Nor should we forget that Stake (amongst others) had a partner who was recently jailed for being involved in organised crime. There are many reasons why CFC would have walked away from the deal; including believing that they could possibly get a better deal elsewhere. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-11661895/MPs-want-investigation-links-jailed-Chinese-billionaire-clubs-betting-partners.html

Looks like we're doing everything we can to bend to his will 😧 Let's hope it doesn't backfire on us. Come Monday, if there's no deal to ship him out, if he's not at Cobham then we need to be looking at' breach of contract'

I thought the theory was that they spent more time on planes flying from one US city to another than doing fitness work and subsequently started the season under-prepared. This lack of fitness was further exacerbated when Potter took over and training sessions became easier and more shambolic.

I think most of us could have predicted this might happen. Let's see...

Or maybe the club's decision in not going ahead with Stake had nothing to do with the CST

Starting as he means to go on? Let's hope so.

I could... but then I'd have to kill you! 😉