Keegans Export

I assume most people (myself included) see the problem being he's a £20-30m player who'll go for £50m+

Can't read anything into the pictures or the protective boot. Until they do a scan to assess the damage it could be anywhere from a week or two to 3+ months.

It's more the wages. You've got CHO, Lukaku and Aubameyang all on 100k+ and they've scored 3 goals all season between them. It's the same issue we've had shifting players. Seeing how the likes of Clark and Hendrick are getting on I've got no doubt the likes of Richie & others would do a good job in the Championship but finding a club willing to pay them £40k/week to do it is a challenge.

Reminds me a bit of when Spurs knew they were going to be selling Bale for a colossal sum and they started splashing the cash. The difference I suppose is that they pretty much knew they were going to sell Bale whereas Chelsea are going to have to seek buyers.

Amazing what you can do when a £1.6bn debt is just wiped out... Obviously I know this has no impact on FFP calculations but it clearly does have an effect on a business or individuals spending power.

Same. Hadn't even considered him as a target now he's heading towards the top end of my shortlist.

I think that's more because they were replacing players who were either playing shit (the defence) or were injured (Wilson with Wood/Isak)

That seems relevant to me and the bit most likely to encourage a challenge, particularly around related party transactions (or specifically about putting a cap on them)

With Wilson 30+ and never going to play 90mins consistently he'll still end up CF more often than not over the coming seasons. I don't think he'll have any issue terrorising defenders coming inside from the left as and when needed.

Did anyone notice Sky put the Denmark flag next to his name rather than the Swedish one when he got subbed on Going to take time to build that chemistry but Isak's runs and Bruno's through balls are going to be like bacon and cheese* - absolutely made for each other. *or insert your own food pairing of choice

From what I can gather, she resigned because Vince came back rather than because PIF have bought the company?

I went crazy and Googled the date of the final. Immediately regretted it and will feel partly responsible if we crash out tonight.

Presumably they're looking ahead and thinking in three years time you'll have Botman (25), Bruno (28), Isak (26) then maybe Tielemans (28), Fresneda (22), Moukoko (21) all with 3-4 years PL experience and you've got the basis of a top four squad. Obviously there's no guarantees but I get the feeling they have complete faith in their "project" and that regardless of where we finish this season they will have a top four/title challenging squad in a few years.

Training ground would make sense. Could be that they've identified the land and are starting to get things in order.

Hearts are on Sky on Sun 29th Jan (Livingstone A, 1.30KO) and Sun 19th Feb (Motherwell A, 12.00KO)

That's what they had in mind when they signed him. Having said that I can see him operating well in the channel between the RB and the RCB and the heat map from @Anonsuggests its something he sort of does already. Whether that would work with Burn at LB I don't know.

Clearly the wrong decision to keep him at the club in my opinion. Doesn't seem to have progressed at all since pre-season, needs to play regular, competitive football. Edit - obviously I mean we should have sent him on loan rather than get rid all together!

Intense is the right word. We've had very good teams over the years, and some functional ones (eg Rafa), but the difference here is that the relentlessness on the pitch matches the atmosphere in the ground. I've never really experienced that before and I'm old enough to recall the Keegan and Robson days.

As far as FFP that's right but it means the new owners had an extra £5bn (or whatever it was) available to them because the PL effectively wrote off the debt rather than paying it off themselves. Not against any rules but also not the same as what happened here, where the buyer was responsible for dealing with any existing debt. It was the debt to Abramovic that got Chelsea to where they are, now they have a new owner who was allowed to take the club on and continue to build on that platform without having to do anything about the debt.

The key thing is that we're not one key player away from the sort of squad we need. If we were then yeah you just spend what it takes (eg Man City with Haaland), but I'd rather see us get two or three in the Botman/Bruno mould rather than one £100m superstar.

Trippier, definitely. Believed in the project from day one and signed up knowing there was every chance he wouldn't even still be around once we started to win things.

Scored an absolutely lush penalty in the shoot-out against Palace too (I know that doesn't count but it was a belter)

I'm not concerned about Man Utd and Liverpool getting rich owners, I'm worried about them getting good owners.

Probably been said before but this Argentina kit would look lovely in black-and-white.

Profit in FFP terms is a bit more complicated. I don't know the details of the Isak deal but let's say it was £60m and a 6-year contract. His book value goes down £10m per season so if we sold him for £60m in three seasons, FFP doesn't see that as breaking even, it sees it as a £30m profit. I do see your point though and you're going to make a lot more profit selling a player for twice what you bought him for.