“Makes no sense”, “that’s too much” – Graeme Souness slams Todd Boehly decision on spending 132M on two players
The reason Chelsea chose to pay so much to sign Marc Cucurella and Wesley Fofana this summer has been questioned by Sky Sports analyst Graeme Souness.
However, Cucurella cost the Blues £62 million, but Souness claims the Spanish international won’t help the team’s starting eleven:
“The money they have spent on Marc Cucurella makes no sense, considering Chelsea already had Marcos Alonso, Ben Chilwell and, at a push, Reece James in the same position. Is Cucurella that much of an upgrade on them? I don’t think so. Chelsea only seem to have taken him because Manchester City wanted him.”
Souness also raised concerns about the decision to recruit Fofana from Leicester. While he feels that Thomas Tuchel needed to reinforce his options at the back, he doesn’t understand why they splashed out so much on a 21-year-old:
“I get that they needed centre-backs because of Antonio Rudiger and Andreas Christensen going and having 37-year-old Thiago Silva, an age when your game can fall off a cliff inside a month. But £70million for Wesley Fofana? At 21, he only brings potential.”
In Fofana’s case, it should be said that the Frenchman has already shown himself to be a very capable Premier League defender, even though he has only spent a short time in England. The £70m will be well worth it if he is a fixture in the first team over the next decade.
When it comes to Cucurella, there is definitely a case to be made that Chelsea did overpay, but the fact that he is very comfortable playing in a three-man defence means he is a very good fit for Tuchel’s system.