One of the real surprises of the transfer window in the end was the arrival of Facundo Buonanotte at Chelsea.
There was almost no rumours building up to it, it just came out of nowhere and was a done deal on a loan.
On the London is Blue podcast they asked Jessica Frota for her thoughts on the Argentina international, who looks like he’s going to be cover for Cole Palmer.
Pundit’s worrying thoughts on attacking midfielder’s potential impact
“He has experience, he’s played for Argentina before, he knows Alejandro Garnacho, he knows Enzo Fernandez, all of that. He has shown glimpses of quality and scored from goals which I think we’ve all seen. But at the same time last season he was not a mainstay in a Leicester side which was very poor,” she explained.
“You could say that he wasn’t able to perform that well because it was a struggling side But you could also say that he was in a struggling side and he could have made a name of his own despite that team and at least be a part of the starting eleven. I mean you’re not talking about this sure thing, right. Not someone that can really elevate us.”
You can see her comments in the clip embedded here:
https://twitter.com/LondonBluePod/status/1964063487359078669
Buonanotte can only impress given low expectations
Well, we’re hoping for more than “glimpses of quality” from a player before we get too excited, even a loan signing.
Still, it’s easy to forget he’s still just 20 years old because he’s been in the Premier League for two years. Having more than 70 appearances by that age in the Prem is no mean feat.
The fact he’s not been able to be registered in the Champions League squad is a real blow given his role as a Palmer reliever.
Still waiting for someone to ask real questions concerning the directors’ poor planning for depth in the center of attack. No matter whether he works out, you can’t argue that the Buonanotte was a well thought out deal. It was obviously a panicked move made after the directors got caught flat-footed in the final days of the window. But how is it that no one is asking “How did they get caught so flat-footed?” How did they let Simons get away? And how was it that a Fermin pipe dream and Buonanotte loan were the only Plan Bs?
This isn’t rocket science. Anyone can read a depth chart and see that once we lined up moves for Guiu, Nkunku AND Jackson, Pedro was the only player we had to back up BOTH Delap and Palmer. We were quite obviously going to be a man short in the center of attack and yet the directors acted like they were oblivious to this fact until Delap went down—and then they panicked. And that’s simply not good enough.
We can praise all of the other good business they did, but tough questions still have to be asked as to how they managed this window because we can ill-afford another such bungling if we’re ever going to close the gap with Arsenal and Liverpool (who both were both ruthless and surgical in adding strength and depth to already top squads).