Sale of 4-assist midfielder undermines Chelsea manager
Chelsea are looking to sell Conor Gallagher, according to a report in ESPN, and Mauricio Pochettino has no say in the matter.
The potential sale is being justified by the club as a Financial Fair Play exercise. Gallagher is a home grown player who therefore cost £0 and has a juicy weight on the club’s balance sheet if sold.
This is just not how you run a club effectively. It makes sense for the manager to not be in total control of transfers, of course, because you don’t want to tailor a whole squad to the style of one coach who can be sacked at relatively short notice. But equally if you give coaches no say in which of their key players stay and go, you’re undermining them and reducing their ability to get the best results, which is the opposite of what you want.
Let’s hope these reports are exaggerating, otherwise we may have some very deep structural issues emerging.