Recruit additional investors? Not sure how that would work. Even if Roman got his rich mates involved, we're only just on the right side of FFP as it is.
Well I could see one potential investor that Roman could get to invest in Chelsea in the form of Usmanov. I mean from what I have read they have done business together in the past and likewise it is clear that Usmanov is getting nowhere with his shareholding at the Arsenal (especially since Kroenke refuses to see that the value of Arsenal as a business is falling as the seasons rolls by). So instead of wasting his time at the Emirates, I would suggest that instead he sells his stake to Kroenke and uses the money to invest into Chelsea instead (for say £700 million), thus enabling Chelsea to properly complete in the transfer/wages market (1) and give a real challenge to the Manchester clubs at the very least (2).
Likewise another options could recruiting Aliko Dangote to invest in Chelsea instead of also wasting his time with the Arsenal, getting other Russian Billionaires involved or even getting the Kremlin themselves involved (even just by having Rosneft and Aeroflot become sponsors of the club while Gazprom increases their involvment with the club) (3).
Finally if the blues do realise that backing FFP was if anything worse than selling KDB, they could always get the Kremlin to "persuade" UEFA into scrapping the boneheaded policy or at least get them to look the other way with Chelsea, after all that is how they got the World Cup in the first place and that is also how they get Gazprom as a CL sponsor.
(1) I would personally suggest rading Spurs of their best players to start things off, especially Kane, Alli, Erriksen, Son, Dier, Wanyama, Alderweireld, Vertonghen, D.Sanchez, Trippier and Lloris.
(2) As well allow Arsenal fans to angry about how Kroenke has helped transform Chelsea fortunes.
(3) Because there is no better way (other than avoid doing stupid decisions like the Russians have done of late) of improving your own image by owning a football club.
We've got very healthy sponsor deals in place.
Without a doubt this is the case. One should give the current board of Chelsea credit for the deals they have brokered, if only they were as good when it came to trasnfers and player development.
We're in the process of sorting out the ground size.
Personally I feel that 60,000 is simply not enough for a club with both the current size (1) and potential (2), rather Chelsea should be looking at building an 80,000 seater stadium instead, which can be done by buying up the current site of the London Oratory School, the Fulham Broadway Shopping Centre and the various properties between the stadium, the shopping centre and the Fulham Road.
(1) Least we not forget that until recently Arsenal regularly filled their 60,000 capacity ground despite 12 years of poor seasons while Spurs have had an average of 68,000 attendence wise at Wembley Stadium despite their highish ticket prices.
(2) Least we not forget that with the decline of Arsenal, Man United still trying to reach the sort of sucess levels they had under Fergie and the uncertain long-term future of Tottenham's current squad, this gives a massive opportunity for Chelsea to dominate the London/Home Counties football fanbase (especially the younger fans who did not grow up under the Graham or Invincible era of the Arsenal nor most of the Fergie era at United) the long run.
However the Blues can only suceed in doing that if they are able to match (or even outcompete) in terms of trasnfers/wages against the Manchester clubs and the El Classico dupoly as well as improve their youth development programes (most of all when it comes to getting academy players into the first team though measures such as more long-term loans and the introduction of a B Team in The Football League). Otherwise it would be other clubs (perhaps even my own eventually) that will end up winning their hearts and minds.
It is also the only way Chelsea can properly financially with the El Classico, PSG and the Manchester clubs, especially once Roman is out of the picture.
I know the club wanted FFP. I've got no complaints about it.
And why would you be in favour your club following FFP? Now if Chelsea had a lock on the domestic game (in terms of fanbase, revenues and suceess on the field) as Bayern Munich does in Germany while being a serious contender for the Champions League on a regular basis, I would understand why you would want to avoid the likes to City from upsurping your club. The fact is though, this is far from the case and thus I am interested in your support for it despite the issues it causes for Chelsea.
Top players want to be first choice. Lukaku would not have signed as a backup (and nor should he) regardless of how many games you think Costa might miss through suspension.
To be fair to Lukaku, I would have only put him into the Chelsea first team during this season. So any "issues" he might have facing competition with Costa would only apply to this season. Reguardless what he feels about the matter, the fact that it is completely irresponsble to have only one good striker in your books. Simply because any injuries, suspenstions or fatigue issues that their one good striker might suffer from gives the club in question a good chance of having their season completely derailed because of it.
So reguardless what Lukaku likes to think, Chelsea needs 2 good strikers on the books to succeed on a consistant basis (as this season is showing) and if Conte is going to continue to use 3-5-2 on some basis or so, then if anything they are going to need to have 3 good strikers on the books.
After all one only has to look at how City faired when we only had Aguero in the CF/ST position, that is every time he got injured it ended up contributing to our poor form in the last few seasons of late. That why the trasnfer for Jesus was so important for City, because it meant that the club were less reliant on Aguero and thus where able to improve their consistency on the field. Hence why we where able to cope pretty easily cope with the loss of Aguero earlier in the season because we had Jesus as well (1).
(1) The same cannot be said for our Winger positions though, hence why it was a horrible decision on City's part in not getting Sanchez in either transfer window, a decision which cost us the Liverpool game (at Anfield), the Wigan FA Cup Game and several other games to various extents. Hence why I feel we need to get Bailey, Salah, Erriksen and (I'm sorry to say this to yourself) Hazard (or at least 2 of those 4) to address this problem.
Luis didn't settle in England and wanted to go home.
You cannot expect players to settle in England after one season though. No matter how good you are as a player.
We got our money back for an unhappy player.
When you look at the bigger picture, his sale was a from a financial perspective it was a disaster for the Blues, since you ended up wasting all that money on Rahman the following season and eventually had to spend £24 Million on Marcus Alonso (1) and £17.5 Million on Emerson to finally have 2 decent options for LB once more.
In other words instead of just spending £24 million on Alonso (to make sure you have 2 good options for LB), Chelsea have ended up spending over £41.5 million instead to sure you had 2 good options for LB.
(1) Although to be fair, his purchase was needed anyway (even if Luis stayed) due to the phase out of Ivanović on RB and the transfer of Azpilicueta to the RCB. Meaning there a lack of decent options for LB, especially when Cole and Bertrand where already out of the picture by the 2014-2015 season.
Not sure how a loan would've benefited anyone when the player didn't want to stay.
It would certainly have benefited Chelsea, firstly by retaining addtional strength in depth for the Fullback positions (especially when Ivanović began to decline) if needs be and secondly by preventing Atletico Madrid from using him against any future fixtures against Chelsea in the Champions League, thus (slightly) improving Chelsea's prospects in said competition.
Salah should've been loaned again, sure.
Agreed, Chelsea had no excuses to let him go just when he was starting to show improvement. Especially when Chelsea themselves have on occasion shown they use the loan system properly to develop both Courtois and Christensen.
Cuadrado was shit for us. Not at all suited to a wingback role in the prem. I'm not in the slightest bit bothered he was sold.
Again, he was only given half a season to prove himself, a time period which even Jose said was too short to make a fair judgement. Thus my point was that when he was doing well at Juventus (at RWB as well), he should have been recalled back to the Chelsea team to see if could work out for them at RWB instead of selling him to Juventus.
Why did Matic want to join a manager who trusts him at the biggest club in the country for a pay increase? Hmmm, I wonder.
If it is simply about a question of money then I can more than understand why Matic wanted to go (1), however if he was so desperate to link up with Jose at United, why did he make no transfer requests or even spread any transfer rumours about wanting to leave Chelsea during the whole of last season (2)? Because during last season it looked like Fabregas would be the midfielder to leave Chelsea instead of him.
(1) Although questions need to be rasied why the idiotic board felt they were better off wasting £40 million (and £110,000 per week in wages) on Tiemoué Bakayoko instead, especially when despite being on slightly less wages than Matic at United, he is definately a downgrade on Matic.
(2) Likewise he was also getting a lot of game time as well under Conte.
