Fabrizio Romano’s Caught Offside column has become essential reading for Chelsea fans in the last couple of years, simply because of the crazy amount of business we’ve been doing.
That should all slow down soon – but there’s still a lot of selling to be done, and top of the list are our academy developed players. It’s been almost two years of constant rumours about Trevoh Chalobah being sold for example, and there seems to be no change on that front.
An update from Romano on that situation revealed that Chelsea are still primed to sell him as soon as they can, despite his recent form. After returning from a long spell out, Chalobah has proved himself as the most effective defender we’ve got.
But those in charge have made their bed, now they must lie in it. Romano references interest from a wide variety of clubs, showing how highly rated the 24 year old is:
“Another defender who could be one to watch on the market this summer is Chelsea’s Trevoh Chalobah, and I thought I’d clarify his situation as some fans have been asking me if his situation could change now that he’s been playing more often recently, and performing well in Mauricio Pochettino’s line up.
“My understanding is that the expectation is still for Chalobah to leave, so that Chelsea can make profit and for Chalobah to be a regular starter.
“I’ve spoken about interest from Bayern Munich and Nottingham Forest in the past, but there’s nothing happening now. Let’s see who’s going to move on that, at the moment there is nothing concrete yet in terms of talks.”
A plan gone horribly wrong
Sadly the plan to sell Chalobah was put in place long ago, and some of the spending on players like Axel Disasi was only committed to because our homegrown favourite was scheduled to leave. The stickiness of the situation has been enhanced by the fact that Chalobah has simply been so much better than the players bought to replace him.
Much as with the Conor Gallagher situation, those making the decisions have painted themselves into a corner.
It’s odd to me that people are getting worked up about Gallagher being sold rather than Chalobah, he’s in my view the best right sided CB at the club, certainly a far superior player to Disasi who we’ve recently brought in.
Whereas Gallagher, despite having a great attitude and mentality, as well giving high effort, is lacking technically, and we can make an upgrade in his position quite easily.
I’m unsure of what Chalobah earns, that would be the only acceptable reason for why we want to move him on, if it’s simply a case of net profit with him being a home-grown player, then this should be the story that is riling up the fans against the owners.
Is sad to be led by clueless leaders
Where are you getting this “they’ve painted themselves into a corner” narrative, SuperFrank??? It’s absolutely incredible to me how consistently you bend whatever piece of “news” you find to fit your favourite narratives—“the owners are ruining the club” and/or “the whole project is a failure and the sky is falling!”
Perhaps they’ve been inured so long that you’ve forgotten about them, but Chalobah isn’t surplus to requirements because of Axel Disasi—it’s because Wesley Fofana and Levi Colwill, when healthy, are better than him! It’s fair to credit Chalobah for having played well in recent weeks, but it’s not like he’s done anything to convince anyone that, in the long run, he’s head and shoulders above our plethora of other options. He’s been solid, but does he look world class? Not to my mind. So, if he’s only ever destined to be a “squad player” and he can fetch a healthy transfer fee then why wouldn’t we sell him on (like we did with Kurt Zouma, for example)?
Chalobah is quite good. If they are looking for who to sell, let them try Badaishille. It is not right selling yo buy when those you are buying haven’t fit in. See the quality of defenders we lost for free; Rudiger and Christensen. World class players . Fofana is always injured and we still need Chalobah. Let them try selling enzo and keeping Gallagher and Chalobah. The money we would realize from selling enzo would be much. We have a lot midfielders injured and the.academy that would do so well.