By Sir Hardly Anyone
Here is the list of ins and outs for the clubs that came in the top six positions in the PL last season as recorded by the Guardian on the constant chart of such things. As can be seen they count Torreira as being signed already, this being the general feeling of the “experts”.
| Club | In | Cost | Out | Income | Loaned out |
| Arsenal | Lucas Torreira | £26.4m | Santi Cazorla | Takuma Asano | |
| Stephan Lichtsteiner | Nil | ||||
| Chelsea | |||||
| Liverpool | Naby Keïta | £52.8m | Emre Can | Nil | Ovie Ejaria |
| Fabinho | £40m | Yan Dhanda | Unknown | ||
| Jon Flanagan | Nil | ||||
| Man City | Yaya Toure | Released | |||
| Pablo Maffeo | Unknown | ||||
| Will Patching | Released | ||||
| Olarenwaju Kayode | £2.6m | ||||
| Man United | Fred | £43.7m | Joe Riley | Unknown | |
| Diogo Dalot | £19m | ||||
| Tottenham Hots | Keanan Bennetts | £2m |
Only one club is recorded as having done nothing at all and that is Chelsea. I suspect (but obviously have no evidence on the matter) that the owner has left in a huff over the fact that he has not been granted his work visa in the UK. I am sure he could still approve any deals that he felt like approving from a distance and maybe Chelsea just haven’t found the right person yet. But I tend to be a bit more suspicious than that.
There is however still plenty of time to go.
Of all the PL teams Brighton (whom we are said by those who find out such things in advance, to be meeting in the first match of the season) have been the most active, signing three and letting six go. Chelsea are in fact the only club in the whole Premier League who have no activity at all. Although I am sure they will make it up later on.
One transfer of one of our old boys has seen Benik Afobe move from Bournemouth to Wolverhampton for £10m. You may recall he moved the other way in 2016.
But to return to Chelsea, many of the stories being reported at the moment are the sort of thing that you see with all of the top six clubs from last season; rumours about who the club is bidding for. However I sense a certain amount of unease from a few of the Chelsea reports.
Thus alongside the sort of stuff that is written about all of the larger clubs such as Chelsea win race to sign PSV Eindhoven defender Ian Maatsen (that from the
I would add for anyone who supports Chelsea, and who is visiting Untold for the first time, this really is what Arsenal get all the time. Welcome to the club of media make believe. (We’re calling these “Jack the Ripper” stories since 99% of the tales of Jack the Ripper that appeared in the late 19th century were also newspaper inventions).
Here is the Chelsea selection.
Chelsea missed out on Thomas Lemar due to managerial uncertainty — report (We ain’t got no history blog)
Chelsea’s transfer-free Blueprint: A plan to (re)build from 48 current Blues (Pride of London)
Chelsea transfer news: Three key stars ‘will leave’ if Antonio Conte is not sacked (Star)
‘This Chelsea board has lost it’ … Blues fans react as club eye surprise deal for £36m star (Football Fancast)
New Real Madrid boss Julen Lopetegui ‘wants to make Chelsea star his first signing’ (Star)
Transfer News: Tottenham surge ahead of Chelsea with Jack Grealish bid (the Express)
Chelsea youngster Harvey St Clair undergoing Venezia medical ahead of signing four-year deal (Daily Mail)
Chelsea considering World Cup manager to replace Antonio Conte (Metro)
Conte prepared to return to Chelsea for pre-season training — report (We ain’t got no history)
Chelsea face difficult decision over Antonio Conte future after Julen Lopetegui takes up Real… (Telegraph)
Forget Chelsea: Tottenham is the perfect destination for this £4.5m-rated attacking sensation (
These are indeed the sort of negative emphasis headlines that we have become used to seeing for Arsenal over recent years. It makes me wonder if the plan of the Jack the Ripper media (ie make it up to get more readers) is simply one that says “we need a couple of doom and gloom clubs and a couple of positive clubs” each summer. I think they are still trying to recover from the balls up they have made over Liverpool transfers and so are putting the boot into Chelsea.
It is not reporting of events so much as deciding in advance which way the wind going to blow in their imaginations.
- Where next for Arsene Wenger?
- Yacine Adli gets the Jack the Ripper treatment from the media and Leno becomes catch of the day
- Proceed with extreme caution but we may have just bought another player
You can just imagine the discussions behind closed doors whilst “randomly” sorting the fixture list.
“I know, let’s make it as difficult as we can for Arsenal’s new man”.
“Good idea. How about Man City and Chelsea for the first two games?”
Hey ho!
Imagine though, the boost to confidence when we take 6 points from both our rivals.
There’s nothing like a good start.;)
And conversely the Premier league have broken their own rules to accommodate Spurs who have failed to get there stadium ready on time.
No surprise there then.
re: Gooner Mikey
I don’t mind the start to our season being difficult. It will show us where we stand vis-a-vis the best in the league. It will clearly show what our new manager thinks of his squad and will show us how he intends to set them up. And, it will motivate the boys to get their act together in the off season. I could be wrong but, doesn’t Man City have more players in the World Cup than us? Could actually benefit us.