Chris Wetherspoon on The Athletic FC Podcast: "Chelsea could lose up to 300 million pounds in 24/25 and not breach PS...

The Athletic FC Welcome to the Athletic FC podcast with me, Ayo Akimolero. Mark Kokoreya has lamented Chelsea's decision to part ways with Enzo Morescar. He joins Enzo Fernandez, who earlier this month said he did not understand the decision. So, our Chelsea's plays now losing faith in the club's hierarchy. All right, in with us today, we've got Liam Toomey and over in Barcelona. We've got Paul Belus as well. All right, so in an exclusive interview with the Athletic, Mark Kokoreya has had his say on the decisions made by Chelsea's ownership. Paul, you spoke to him. I mean, this was a really fascinating interview. What was Kokoreya like first? Because I know he's got his perceptions here in the UK. You know, he sometimes seems like a little bit of a villain to opposition fans, doesn't he? Yeah, I mean, he does like that, but won't just pick to him. You can see a really honest, really laid back person and a person that really like thinks about what he's saying. Well, I was doing the interview and the sense I got is that he cared about how the team was going, how the team is doing. And if Chelsea basically can perform at the highest level, that's his biggest obsession. And in a way, that's what comes across in the interview. I guess because his frustration starts appearing just as we speak about the PSG. In the Champions League, I think this is a game that is key in a way for Chelsea players to see where they are as a project. And the result and how it ended up, basically, it exposed how a big part of the dressing room feels. I mean, I think that Kokoreya spoke from that side of his chest, basically. And yeah, we could see that he's a player that he's been frustrated by the direction that Chelsea has been going over the last few months. And specifically, we've in Zamaniska's departure that has been a painful thing to go through for this dressing room as we could see. Did you get a sense of him being a leader in that gesture? Because we often talk about the age profile of the Chelsea team. He would be one of the slightly older ones, what, at 26, 27. And he's been there what for four years now. So you think he'd sort of had mass some sort of status there. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. You have the feeling that he's an influential member of that dressing room. I mean, when he signed for the club, Todd Boyley had just taken over the club, basically Thomas Tuchel was the manager. So just to have an idea about that and how Chelsea have changed over the years. And I think that he feels like that. He feels like an important people in that direction room. We ask him off the record, like, are you really the strongest boys in there? He was like, well, maybe I didn't shout at players too much. But I feel that when I speak, they just respect me. And that I feel an important person in that dressing room. So yeah, I don't think that there's many other big boys in that Chelsea team. Okay. Now, when we talk about the ownership and this is something I picked up from your piece, there seems to be a bit of frustration from his perspective. Can you just exactly pinpoint what his frustrations are in regard to the ownership at Chelsea? Yeah. So basically, I think that they go towards again going to that PSG defeat and what it brought to the team. To the fact that Chelsea ownership has a clear policy of signing young players and just looking for the future and, of course, trying to get players that will have a resale value and looking at the financial side of the club as well. Then when you bring that to Champions League football and to the big level of football, sometimes you might find that there's a shortage of ready-made talent. And that's what Kukurelia felt most frustrated with. On top of that, as we mentioned, like the changes of managers and the feeling that the club was going from one side to another side, it didn't feel like he had any hard feeling towards Liam Rossini, actually, he spoke well about Liam Rossini, but gave me the feeling that Rossini awoke into a mess that he didn't make, basically. Well, Liam, Kukurelia described Moreska as the most important manager he'd worked with at Chelsea echoing the view of Enzo Fernandez as well. Does this feel like a decision that most of the squad are still a little bit baffled by? It certainly feels like it hasn't been fully processed by a significant chunk of the squad. I mean, Pedro Neto and Malogusto were two more players who came out in far less incendiary terms than Enzo Fernandez and Mark Kukurelia over the last few months, just to say how much of a shock it was, which I think it was to the squad. It was very abrupt the way that Moreska's departure came about around the turn of the year. It's not necessarily fair to frame it as Chelsea sacking Moreska. As we discussed at the time, I think this was a genuinely mutual situation. I don't think Chelsea were super keen to make a mid-season coaching change. There were clear issues with Moreska, which we detailed in our inside read at the time, and the direction of travel was probably towards a parting in the summer, but it was Moreska that really forced the issue in terms of leaving when he did. But I can understand, you know, Fernandez saying he didn't understand it, and now Kukurelia saying he wouldn't have made that decision, or, you know, he would have maybe found a way to wait until the offseason. But the fact that this is being said publicly is clearly very uncomfortable for Chelsea's ownership and sporting leadership. Yeah, we'll go into that a little later on. Something that Paul said that I thought was also really fascinating was that Kukurelia has praised Rasenia, but cited the fact that things aren't as stable as they were understandably. How much of an issue is this instability? Because much of what we've spoken about is that can Rasenia get these lads back on track? But let's not forget, it's been a relatively turbulent season for many of these players. Yeah, I mean, they didn't go into it in the ideal circumstances because they had the pressure of dearly crowned world champions, but without any kind of preseason because of that tournament. So they were already a physical disadvantage relative to a lot of their Premier League and Champions League rivals. And I think that is a factor in what we're seeing now. But the fact that there's also been a midseason coaching change, another one under Bluco, has set things back just when I think quite a few of these players. And it's important to note that I don't think every member of the squad viewed Morescar the way that Enzo Fernandez and Mark Kukurelia do. But they were clearly two of his biggest disciples on the pitch and in the dressing room and two members of this leadership group. And I think there probably is a feeling regardless of how players felt about Morescar that this is just another reset that sets them back, almost irrespective of what they think of Rezenia. It's just another step back just when I think a lot of these players felt like they were ready to take a big step forward going into this season. Now you bring in another young coach younger than Morescar was with even less on his track record. And I think Rezenia has made a good impression on most of them, certainly on a personal level. But it's an unforgiving environment to come into in the middle of a season. You know, Rezenia's first month was a nine-game month. And Kukurelia references that. They really haven't had much time to train his ideas. And while Chelsea were looking at Rezenia as a continuation of Morescar tactically, no two coaches are the same. Rezenia's got his own ideas, things he wants to do slightly differently, and he's been trying to implement those. But I think some of what we've been seeing from Chelsea on the pitch, particularly defensively, maybe their lack of structure in transition defensively, is a ripple effect of Rezenia trying to implement things and maybe just not having the time at a crucial point in the season. Now Paul, I'm interested in Kukurelia's sort of standing with the Spanish team. We saw him obviously lift the Euros very recently with that team. A newer edition at that time. But I don't know with the media coverage and the song that we hear the Kukurelia Kukurelia song. There's a feeling that he's now embedded himself as part of the Spanish team moving forward. No, absolutely, absolutely. It's totally different. As you said, he came in at the Euros at the 2024 Euros, basically as an emergency column, because a couple of Lesbaks have been injured. Josiluska, yeah, from Valencia and Alejandro Valde were just injured. He was called up last minute and he had to compete with the Alejandro Grimaldo for the place at the life back. But he really impressed in trainings. He was given the chance to start at the Euros and he hasn't looked back since. Right now, he's going to go to the World Cup as the startless starting left back for Spain. He's an important dressing room member in that team as well. The coach, Luis de la Fuente, has given a lot of priority to create a good harmony in the dressing room and to make sure that everyone gets along really well and Kukurelia's key on that, because he's so outgoing, so laid back, he likes to crack a joke, but in the same way, he loves to compete. He embodies the exact mindset that Spain manager is just looking for his team. Yeah, Liam, could his success with the national side have exacerbated his frustrations at Chelsea? Well, I guess there is a natural contrast there. I must say, I don't think Chelsea's a particularly dysfunctional dressing room. We've always got the sense, you know, as part of the Huddle building team chemistry and morale, you get the impression that these group of players like each other. I don't think there are like massive counterproductive cliques. I think that, you know, the Spanish-speaking players are obviously culturally close, but I think it's quite a bonded dressing room. Everyone, of course, is famously of quite a similar age, so that probably helps as well. But it is necessarily a less stable environment when you're getting this coaching churn, when every summer window you get a significant player churn as well around these core players. I think that's potentially a bit destabilizing, but I think the bigger issue is that probably when Mark Correa goes off on Spain GT, he sees a group of players that are ready to win right now. And that isn't necessarily what some of these big players at Chelsea are seeing. I think we've seen Enzo Fernandez allude to that as well, that these guys have been there since the start of this project pretty much. They were among the first players brought in in the first two windows. And when you see window after window, okay, there have been the occasional super impactful signing like Trial Pedro last summer, but there have been a lot more 18, 19, 20, 21-year-olds. And I know Chelsea are exceptionally bullish about the talent and potential of these guys long-term, but you could be forgiven if you're a player like Fernandez who's 25 now, Correa who's 27 now, I think he turns 28 this summer, for looking around thinking, well, how much longer do I have to wait before we're actually in a Premier League title race or in a Champions League semi-final with designs of going to the final? I think the club World Cup maybe gave everyone at the club a sense of validation, a sense that the things were moving in the right direction, but Maurizca's departure has set that back. And I think a lot of those players now looking, is this another two, three-year build? And do I want to be part of another long-term build? Yeah, Paul, Correa said an offer from Barcelona would be hard to turn down. What's the likelihood of him going to Barcelona this summer? Yeah, I mean, right now I see it difficult for like many things besides the financial aspect that Barcelona has in here. But Correa is a Chelsea, he extended his contract last summer, he's not in a bad salary. Barcelona in that position have Alejandro Walde, I don't envisage Barcelona as a club that are close to listen to offer for Walde. They would, if there's a good offer, they would happily listen to that. But if they sell Walde, I don't know if they can afford to buy a player as in with the salary status that Marco Cucurilla has. Now, I think that when Cucurilla spoke about this, it's because of course he has a strong feeling towards Barcelona. He was grown up in that your academy, and when you ask him about Barcelona, he's a bit of a difficult position as well to say no, I don't want to go back because he, of course, he's a Barcelona fan. But then realistically, I see it difficult to feed for all sides. Although, as I said, I don't see Barcelona close to sell Alejandro Walde but at the same time to bring in a player who has already a big salary and he's older than Alejandro Walde. Let's see if Barcelona sees that. Okay, yesterday before you go, and we were talking about the World Cup, and Karl and also Felipe, they were pointing out France mate. With a close second being Spain, because we were talking about the talent pool, where do you see the Spanish in this World Cup? Are they favourites or second favourites? I think they are top favourites. I think they are top favourites. I would say that though. And I'm trying to be as objective as I can here, but I think they just have the best, possibly the best squad, but what they have the best is the way that they played, that they know each other, clear philosophy on how to play. As in, when you don't play well, you know what to do better because you know how you want to play. So that's what the Spain has and that's a really good thing to have because when you're a bit lost, you know your way. You know the path that you have to go back to. And yeah, that sort of philosophy. I think that it's what strengthens Spain's case a bit more. Of course, that's France who has an incredible squad depth and the amount of talent upfront is amazing. But I think that the collective thing that the Spain has assembled is really important in these sort of competitions. Okay, well as you said, Mark Cucurea is firmly embedded in that team as well. Paul, appreciate your time as always. It's been a pleasure. This is the Athertic FC podcast with I.O. Aguilari. Chelsea's ownership are no strangers to having their critics and doubters, but concerns from inside the club are certainly harder to ignore. Liam, with these comments, do you think it would have perked the ears of Blueco and do you think they're aware of all this noise? Yeah, I think it will make them really uncomfortable and probably quite angry that this is being said publicly. But I'm sure it's not anything that hasn't been relayed in some form privately as well. I'm sure some of these players have made these points internally that they're maybe looking for a bit more experience around them. I think Maresco made references to that. Pochettino was very overt in terms of making references to it. So it's not as if this is the first time that it's really come from inside the house, the call has come from inside the house, but the fact that it's two members of the leadership group of this very young squad saying, we could maybe do with a bit more experience around us. I think it's differently with the ownership and sporting leadership because it is a lot easier to brush it off when it's fans or even when it's journalists, you can say people on the outside don't have the full picture. They're not dealing with the information. They don't see what we see. But players do, they're there every day. They see the project up close and they tend to have a pretty good feel for where it is. And if you have players in their prime years that sense the momentum stalling around them, it's natural that they would ask questions. Now, I don't think we've got any sense that Mark Kukareya is looking to get out of Chelsio. Enzo Fernandez is obviously giving out much more ambiguous signs seems deliberately so about his future. Kukareya's comments seem to come from a more genuine concern of, he's happy at the club, he's happy in London, he wants to win. He's competing for the biggest trophies with Spain. He wants to do the same at club level and it seems to be more of a concern that Chelsio aren't as far along that path as he would hope. In terms of the recruitment then, are there any inklings that, if the opportunity did present itself, they might dare I say it, go for a 30 year old player. He's got some airmiles on him. Do you know what I mean? Like, because, yes, there's your pedros at this world. I'm brilliant and he's been fantastic, a great addition. But just someone who's got the airmiles of having been to a cup final played in the Champions League regularly just to steady that ship a little bit in various parts of the pitch. Chelsio has always insisted that there is no hard and fast under 23 recruitment policy that if the right player, the right price, comes available and they are a veteran with experience and the right character, the club would look to bring them in and we were repeatedly told that they had interest in signing Virgil Van Dyke as a free agent last summer. No idea whether that interest was ever reciprocated and never looked like he was particularly close to leaving a Liverpool. But at a certain point, actions speak louder than words. You can say what you want about while we're always open to experience. But you look at the player's Chelsea actually signed last summer. Jal Pedro, I think, was the exception. He was 23. He was about to enter his prime years. I think that's exactly the type of age you would like to sign a player as a top club because if they haven't already made the leap in many cases they are about to and maybe just need a bigger stage in order to do it and that has certainly been born out with him. But when you look at some of the other players that they signed last summer and the age is it's 21, 2019, 18 and like I said, I think Chelsea are extremely high and the potential of a lot of these guys, particularly someone like Esteveau, who I think has justified that with the flashes that he's shown this season. But it does reinforce the idea that these are the players that you are targeting often at the opportunity cost of maybe going for slightly more ready players. The thing about signing young players and I think we've spoken about this on a previous pod before is that you would expect them to grow together, right? So you're at a point where, let's say in three or four years time, they've got the MRS together and they're fighting together. But that requires the entirety of that team staying together. How damaging is it when you aren't hitting those highs? Players become dissolutioned. Enzo Fernandez has been uttering certain things. They might leave. Then that starts that cycle once again. There you haven't got the continuity going to another season. And you almost have to start again. Yeah, I mean, it only takes one or two. Every player is a different personality. They've all got a different viewpoint, maybe different career priorities. And they'll look at things. They'll look at the project and they'll look at their own career slightly differently. And at the moment, it looks like Enzo Fernandez, at least publicly, is looking at his career slightly differently. Now, I don't want to fall close on the possibility that this all ends in a new contract, because we reported a couple of months ago that him and Moises Kaisido were two of several players who were keen to discuss improved terms. But it only takes one to say, okay, I don't believe in this more or any more. I want to get out of here for whatever reason. And then once you lose one of those players, which Blueco haven't yet, it sends a very different message about what the operation is. Suddenly, it looks like, okay, are we a selling club? Are we a rung below Real Madrid, or the very top Premier League clubs, or are we trying to compete with them? That, I think, is the difficulty that they face this summer. It feels like we say this every summer now that this is the most crucial summer of Blueco's ownership. But it really does feel that way this year, because this is the first time that they look in genuine danger of potentially losing a player that they, all things being equal, wouldn't want to lose. Now, of course, they hold the cards in basically all of these situations. Kukareya has two years left on his contract, which is typically the point where Chelsea looked to either extend or sell. So that's a bit of an exception. But Endo Fernandez is contracted until 2032. Most of this core is under contract that stand for bridge through the end of the decade. So if anyone wants to come and buy them, they're going to have to pay up. And any sales will be on Chelsea's terms for the most part. But that doesn't mean that you have all of the leverage in a situation. Players can still make life a bit uncomfortable. They can still say things publicly that the club will maybe not happy about them saying, as Endo Fernandez has been doing with these references to Madrid recently. You're listening to the Athletic FC podcast, with Iawakimu Leirei. Well, the ownership could have fives to put out elsewhere. As Chelsea have posted, the largest pre-tax loss in English football history. Q are finance football writer Chris Wetherspoon who's just joined us right on time, and we've been talking about recruitment, we've been talking about, management, now we need to talk about the money. Chris, Chelsea have announced a 262.4 million pounds that's 349 million dollar deficit in their accounts. I mean, I would say how significant is this, but this sounds like a whole heap of money. But I mean, to most people of this, if I lost 262 million pounds, I'd be quite concerned. The first thing we're going to do is that'd be quite concerned. The first thing really actually to say, this is almost not news. We reported on a new, from a UEFA report at the end of February, that Chelsea were going to make, the biggest loss in English club was ever made. And even the fact that actually this 262 million differs from what is in our UEFA report, kind of shows up the entire madness of this situation. So in the UEFA report, the loss was 342 million. Which I don't think you need a mass degree to know is quite a distance from 262 million. And you know, that stems from the fact Chelsea are in a multi-club group, so they have some costs that don't appear in their accounts. It stems from your UEFA rules around spread and transfer fees over five years, whereas in the accounts Chelsea can still spread them over nine or whatever it is. However many years they've signed players on. There must be other things going on that we won't see until we get the full account. At the risk of branching out to somewhere you maybe weren't expecting when you asked the question when we talked about significance, I think it kind of, it probably points to a wider issue that Chelsea intentionally otherwise have highlighted over the past couple of years. I'm not going to say that clubs haven't gained the system forever in a day, but we're kind of seeing that on steroids now. I mean the fact is that Chelsea and people's immediate reaction when that news came out about the loss was like well they must have failed PSR and the truth is that they haven't. They're absolutely fine and people say well how can that be? That's my first question. How on earth are they doing this? Like this is insane. It is, it's mental and it's because they sold the women's team or they moved the women's team within their group for a paper profit of I think it was $198 million. The paper proceeds were $200 million in Premier League PSR rules. There's nothing to stop you doing that. So they carry that, they carry that profit forward into the year they make a massive loss and they're fine. I did a piece last June where we said, you know what, as mental as it seems, Chelsea could lose up to 300 million pounds in 24, 25 and not breach PSR and they've lost a little under that and not breach PSR. So it's all, it makes a mockery of the rules. There's a definite feeling as well that Chelsea have kind of acted smartly. Some would say in kind of putting all these things through while they can. So PSR disappears from view domestically at the end of this season. So the losses at the bottom line don't matter anymore. Clubs aren't going to get domestically, I should say. They're not going to get assessed on that. So it's kind of well, if they push all this through now and get all the business done that they want to get done, which is a caveat in itself, let's say that they have, then they're fine. So the Premier League, UEFA is a different story. We already know that they breach UEFA's rules and they're in a settlement agreement. But what appears to be the case with the settlement agreement with UEFA when they came to it last June, I think, it appears that they said to UEFA, we're going to lose a lot of money, 24, 25, it's going to be this figure. If you read the settlement agreement with UEFA, they've basically said, as long as you don't actually the figure you've told us, okay, but next year you've got strong, you've got tight limits. So effectively, last season, 24, 25, we don't know exactly what's in there, but they put through, we know from our report on privacy, they've impaired player values, where they think they won't, like the coupon, whatever they paid on there, there's some other asset write downs, apparently, in there. It seems they've put them through in 24, 25, no one A that they've got the headroom with the Premier League, and B with UEFA, they've already told UEFA, we're going to have a big loss, and then from this season on, the idea is to be in theory, I'm not going to say sustainable, but to make smaller losses. But the thing about all this, we still haven't seen the full accounts, and the interesting thing is that, Chelsea make a habit of saying, you know, actually, like we're profitable at the operating level, or something along those lines, and that's really true if you include player sales, which it's debatable that you can include them at the operating level. You know, if nobody wanted to buy any of Chelsea's players, they'd be quite a bit of difficulty. And I think what will also be interesting really is, when we do get these full accounts, is how much did Blue Corps have to put it? In the first two seasons, they put in the thick end of 800 million pounds. Now, that was to facilitate this enormous transfer spend. It would be interesting to see how much they had to put in last season. Yeah, very quickly. And I don't know if there's a succinct way of saying this, there'll be other fans listening to this, Everton fans for that matter. I'm not even for his fans of that matter, maybe even Lester fans going, have we been slapped on the wrist with fines and stuff, and Chelsea is still kind of getting away with it in a weird way? I think it comes back to football as a sport, versus football as a business. And it feels like we're lurching very far to the latter. And it feels like a lot of Chelsea's activity in the last couple of years has been... Look, I said before, some people may label it as smart, some people may say, but why wouldn't they do this? But it feels very much like they've gone, we want to come in, we want to spend a lot of money on players, we want to completely revamp the recruitment and the makeup of the squad, which they have. I think they've got the youngest team in the Premier League. And that's the way they want to do it. And they've kind of gone, well, we'll take the hit of these kind of regulatory issues in the early years in order to get to that position. And what they've managed to do domestically at least, it's a lot harder to do it, which you were, as it's been proven, domestically they've managed to basically exploit loads of loopholes. And now we've seen other clubs do the same. We saw Newcastle United claim that this wasn't a primary motivation, and that may be true, but Newcastle bagged their first profit under their current orders earlier this week through Selency and James' Park to a group company. So we've seen other clubs do it. I think the point around Everton, Forrest and Leicester, I think out of those three, I would say Everton fans can probably feel the most aggrieved. Based on what has happened since with other clubs, it feels like Everton were really kind of held up as, no, don't mess us around. But actually we're seeing fairly egregious examples, of the rules being not broken, because they haven't, at least with the Premier League, certainly exploited. And I think Everton fans are particularly that can feel quite aggrieved. What about the added pressure, Liam, of not qualifying for the Champions League next season, especially for this project moving forward, and we're talking about balancing books, whichever way they might be trying to do that. But I mean, that's serious revenue, not coming into the club. Yeah, it is. And they've, you know, they're insulated slightly by the fact that they got this bumper club World Cup win-full last summer. And I think they had some flexibility, Chris, no more about this than me, about which year they banked that in and how much of it they banked in which financial years. So I'm sure they'll do that in the most strategically beneficial way for them, whatever that is. Yeah, so on that, to be fair, they don't really have the flexibility. It's just because the tournament spun the end of June. That's how you recorded effectively when you earned it. So the rounds after July 1st, the rounds of this one? Yeah, which are obviously the most lucrative ones. So I think, again, I haven't seen the full account, so it's hard to say, but from looking at other things, at a rough estimate, I think they made, we think about 84, 85 million overall. I think 20 million that out went into 24, 25. So you're talking about 65 million, dropping into the currencies and plus the Champions League revenue. Yeah, yeah. So I mean, that will obviously help, but projecting forward, it will hurt next year, at no Champions League revenue, non-club world cup year, and the bigger picture is that would make three out of the first four blue co-seasons ending in no Champions League football. And clearly, financially, that's a problem, but it's arguably an even bigger problem on a sporting level, because it affects the players that you can attract. It affects maybe the players you can keep. You know, we've been talking about that a lot on this podcast. It's not going to make those conversations with the lights of Inza Fernandez, Mark Cacarere, and any other major player at Chelsea. Easier about the club's ambitions moving forward, when you say, the bar to qualify for the Champions League has never been lower. It was top five, not top four, and we still couldn't make it in year four of this project. And I think, as a corollary to that, certainly the Inza Fernandez example, we did a piece on the site recently that talked about when Chelsea was signing these players on a really long terms. And Fernandez, for example, they signed in before you were there in the Premier League broke this ruling about five years. So they can still spread his cost over, it's ended up in nine, eight and a half years, this contract, because they took the extension out. But the issue with that is when they, if they want to sell them, or perhaps if the player doesn't want to be around anymore, for a club whose business world is very heavily reliant on selling players and very heavily reliant on selling them out of profit, that becomes incredibly hard to do. Like, we didn't estimate in that piece. And Fernandez, they would have to hit around 75 to 80 million, just to break even on it. Now, because people are like, well, he's worth 100 million. Like, well, okay, but you're already actually making 20 million profit kind of thing. You know, like, when Liverpool, just to use an example, when Liverpool sold Coutinho, the easy example that everyone goes to, that set them up massively, because they made an enormous profit on them, whereas actually with Chelsea, it's very difficult to do that. And I think I understand the player trend thing and truthfully this season, you know, they sold players for, we think around 300 million last summer. There's two things on that. One, of course, from a cash perspective, that's a big boost. But we don't know how much of that was actually profit. We don't know how much of that is actually help in the bottom line. And I think you've nailed it really late. Like, of course, it's a sporting issue, but it's also increasingly a financial issue. Chelsea, what are the clubs that you look at the money they spend? And the numbers don't add up if they're not in the Champions League? That was my biggest worry when we saw Enzo Fernandez come in, Liam, 100 million plus. Moses Quisado, 100 million plus. Big, big fees to try and recoup back. Do you think Chelsea are in a position with a lot of the buys that they've brought in? Especially at that level. If they do leave to recoup back a similar money, they're, I say, a profit from those big, big, bought players. Well, I think it's important to distinguish those two deals because those transfer fees were such outliers even for Chelsea. I think that's signaled at the time and it was very clear from the messaging coming out of Stanford Bridge, these two players in particular Fernandez and Quisado were not bought to be sold. They were bought to be long-term pillars of the next great Chelsea team. And so if you have to turn round and sell Fernandez this summer, that is an admission that something has gone quite significantly against the plan because, you know, not just on an accounting level, but he was supposed to be there for his prime years and they were banking on him to be one of the leaders of the team. So I think that's why they set themselves up in that sense by agreeing to pay so much and spread it over such a long period of time because they were thinking, well, these other players around the edges, we can trade. We've paid less for them. They're on reasonable salaries, which is what we're always told, reasonable-based salaries. And the evidence of the last three, four years is that when Chelsea have really wanted to sell players, by and large, they've been able to, and occasionally they've been able to sell them for very good prices. I mean, you know, someone like Noni Madoukai are some of them and they made a very, very handsome profit on him. But that was never intended, I think, to be the case with players like Fernandez and Kaisido in particular. And if it does end up being the conclusion of the Fernandez story, I think that's one that they'll have to chalk up as one that didn't go to plan. Okay. Chris, I better let you go. I really appreciate your time, as always. Thanks, guys. Right, Liam. Before we go, we need to talk about Mikhaila Modrick. He hasn't featured for Chelsea since 2014 after being banned. Testing positive for doping. I've seen the social media footage of him practicing by himself, hitting the crossbar, trying to set up goals. But what is the latest with him? Is he coming back to Chelsea? Is he training again? He's certainly training, as people will have seen from his social media. He's been doing solo sessions at Oxbridge FC's ground honeycroft. And I got the chance to go down and watch him this week. And the thing for me was, how do you stay ready as a footballer when you're not allowed to play football? And I mean, it was clear immediately that Modrick is taking this incredibly seriously. He's in fantastic shape physically. He's lost none of the speed or the acceleration. The day that I watched him on was a shooting day. So he was doing a lot of different shooting drills. And there was still plenty of evidence of that incredible shot power that fans will remember from when he last played for Chelsea. I remember one shot crashing off the crossbar and the noise reverberated around the whole ground rebounded towards the half-way line. He didn't miss that many, but the ones he did miss, he was definitely hard on himself. It's clear that he's taking it very, very seriously. He's trying to hold himself to high standards, despite not knowing when this disciplinary process with the FA will conclude. He was charged with a breach of their anti-doping violations back in June 2025, and we're 10 months on from that. 16 months on from when he last played for Chelsea, when he scored, and he gets Heidenheim in UEFA conference league. That feels like a long time ago in football and it's a long time in Modrick's career. He was 23 then. He turned 25 in January. And Chelsea is supporting him, of course. He's their player, but they're not allowed to organize anything for him so everything that he's doing, at Oxford GFC, from renting the pitch to hiring coaches and inviting other players on the day that I watched him. There were two goalkeepers brought in to try and save the shots, not with much success a lot of the time. That's all arranged by his team for the regulations at this point in the process. So it's a difficult situation and Chelsea have obviously had to plan their squad accordingly, signing Alejandro Garnetto and Jamie Gittens last summer to compete for minutes on the left wing. And we ultimately just don't know how or when this is going to be resolved. The maximum ban that Modrick could get is four years. He's already missed, as I said, 16 months, which historical precedent would suggest will be counted as time served in any punishment. And if he's found innocent, he could resume his career immediately. But everything is still very up in the air. It made for quite a surreal experience watching him. But it was very, very clear that you're still watching a Premier League talent and a Premier League athlete, albeit one in a very unusual situation. OK, well, Chelsea faced Port Vell in the FA Cup this weekend where they'll look to be quieting the noise in many respects for now at least. Matt Davis Adams will be with you tomorrow to preview the weekend action, including Manchester City versus Liverpool. Thanks Liam, Paul and also Chris and also thank you guys for joining us as well. Catch you soon. You've been listening to the Athletic FC podcast. The producers would guide Clark, Root and J. Biel with editing by Paul Eiliff and Nick Thompson. The executive producer is AD Morehead. To listen to other great Athletic podcast for free, including our dedicated club shows, search for the Athletic wherever you get your podcasts. You'll also find us on YouTube at the Athletic FC podcast, so make sure you subscribe. The Athletic FC podcast is an Athletic Media Company production. Thank you. Thank you.