Super Frank Lampard - A Managerial Adventure

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Starting XI - Courtois, Azpilicueta, Dragovic, Rudiger, Ivanovic, Matic, Loftus-Cheek, Gundogan, Hazard, Oscar, Costa.

That was pretty special. Away from home at the Emirates we not only managed to stop Arsenal from scoring but we grabbed a couple of away goals which give us a lead going into the home leg. Eden Hazard skipped past almost the entire Arsenal back line and scored a delightful chip over Szczesny in goal to put us ahead. Diego Costa broke his goalless run with a late goal to put us firmly in command. That is now also 3 games in a row without conceding a goal.
 
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Starting XI - Courtois, Azpilicueta, Dragovic, Rudiger, Ivanovic, Matic, Loftus-Cheek, Gundogan, Hazard, Oscar, Costa.

Another win and another clean sheet in a massive game. With the win we managed to leapfrog Aston Villa and into 7th place which could leave us with a Europa League spot. Diego Costa seems to have suddenly decided to score goals again and got the only goal of the match by sliding across infront of a defender and using the very tip of his toes to deflect the ball into the net following a good cross from Hazard. Momentum.
 
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Starting XI - Courtois, Azpilicueta, Dragovic, Rudiger, Ivanovic, Matic, Loftus-Cheek, Gundogan, Hazard, Oscar, Costa.

And of course we threw it away. We let two goals go in the last 12 minutes which took the game to extra time and then penalties which we of course lost 4-3. Absolutely gutted about this as our last chance of Champions League football goes out the window, especially if Arsenal go on to win it.
 
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Starting XI - Courtois, Azpilicueta, Dragovic, Rudiger, Ivanovic, Martinez, Gundogan, Oscar, Hazard, Sisto, Costa.

A solid win in our penultimate game of the season against a Leicester side filled with golden oldies. Mario Mandzukic, Bastian Schweinsteiger and Thiago Silva all lined up against us but couldnt do anything to prevent each of our forward line grabbing a goal with Costa, Hazard and Sisto all getting on the scoresheet as well as a headed Dragovic goal from a corner. This result guarantees us 7th place in the league and keeps us in with a shout of 5th.

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Starting XI - Courtois, Azpilicueta, Terry, Dragovic, Ivanovic, Matinez, Gundogan, Oscar, Hazard, Sisto, Costa.

A gutting end to the season but as it turns out, even if we had won it wouldnt have made any difference. We played poorly for the entire match and were lucky to be ahead thans to goals from Oscar and Gundogan. That however did not make Welbecks last second goal any easier to take as we drew our last game.
 
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So there will be no European football whatsoever at Stamford Bridge next season which puts us in a real financial nightmare. I said right when I took the Chelsea job that it was going to be a period of transition and the squad needs a real overhaul and that is what next season is all going to be about. I have already had Azpilicueta, Costa and Hazard banging on my door requesting to leave and I am torn on if I should let them go or not. Hazard in particular is an issue as he only has two years remaining on his contract. If he doesnt get any happier then he could refuse contract talks and leave on a free which I really cant afford. Anyway, the board have given me a preliminary budget of £36 million to spend and almost £700k in spare wages to use up. The downside is I will only be given 40% of any incoming transfers so I will have to chose who to sell carefully.
 
I think £36m is a decent budget, surely if you sell off 1 or 2 players the board may be willing to increase the % you get to keep? Good luck over the summer,
 
Mate loving the storyvery well laid out. Quick question what facepack are you using it looks awesome?
 
Tracz said:
I think £36m is a decent budget, surely if you sell off 1 or 2 players the board may be willing to increase the % you get to keep? Good luck over the summer,
Click to expand...

Yeah it gives me enough room to get what I want done :) managed to wangle it up a little bit as well.
 
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A massive summer of change at Chelsea Football Club. A lot of the players were very unhappy about not playing in Europe and while I managed to convince some of them to give us another season, some just had to go. All in all we managed to raise an astonishing £134 million in player sales. After the first few sales went through the board decided to trust in my rebuilding project and up my transfer percentage to %100 which gave me a lovely big transfer kitty to spend.

Out.

Ilkay Gundogan - Everton - £40 mil
Fernando - Reading - £1.5 mil
Asmir Begovic - Fiorentina - £10 mil
Arkadiusz Milik - Valencia - £13.25 mil
Gary Cahill - Real Madrid - £1.25 mil
Pione Sisto - Barcelona - £30 mil
Bernard - Real Madrid - £12 mil
Ramires - Granada - £4 mil
Branislav Ivanovic - Real Madrid - £1.5 mil
Baba Rahman - Barcelona - £20 mil
Ayoze Perez - Southampton - Loan
Loic Remy - Released
John Terry - Retired

​

Some of those transfers are just insane amounts of money. Everton were desperate to land their number one target in Gundogan and they paid well over his worth to get him so I am not complaining. Sisto is the other real money spinner. Dortmund came in with a bid of just over 20 mil for him which I accepted but then Barca decided they wanted him and pushed them all the way up to 30 mil which he accepted. The other thing to consider is the wages saved in amongst this lot. Gundogan, Cahill, Terry, Remy, Baba, Ramires and Bernard were all earning £100k plus a week and the likes of Begovic, Fernando and Ivanovic were not far off that. After some fiddling with the budget and doing some sums the board decided that I would have just over £110 mil to spend in the transfer window and plenty of wages to go after anybody I wanted, with that in mind I set to work.


In

Ross Barkley - Everton - £30 mil + add ons
Bruno Martins Indi - FC Porto - £23 mil
Jonothan Silva - Sporting £23 mil
Lewis Cook - Liverpool - £25 mil
Jack Wilshere - Free Transfer
Allan McGregor - Free Transfer
Jese - Real Madrid - Loan
Dom Solanke - Promoted from U21s
Jay Dasilva - Promoted from U21s
Nicolas Tie - Promoted from U21s​


Ross Barkley was my number one target right from the word go and we had to outspend Man City to nab him. A hugely expensive transfer for the club that will end up costing us about £40 mil in fees and just shy of £200k a week in wages but this lad is seriously hitting some form now and I wanted him for the heart of the new look Chelsea side. Lewis Cook is another lad I remembered fondly from my days with Leeds and I couldnt think of anybody I would rather have alongside Barkley to form a young English core to the side. He has been ripping it up at Liverpool so it took the best part of £25 mil to secure his signature. Jack Wilshere was a bit of a gamble. Still only 26 he has been released by Arsenal because of his injury problems so I snapped him up to play a rotational role in the middle of the park. Martins Indi is one of the finest centre backs in world football on the game and has been in superb form so he came in to replace the outgoing Terry and Cahill which will push Christensen out wide to the right back position as cover for Azpilicueta. Jese comes in as cover for the strike force to replace the unhappy Ayoze Perez loaned out to Southampton and Allan McGregor was a free backup option to replace Begovic as our #2. Dasilva and Silva will rotate at left back to replace the outgoing Baba while Dom Solanke has been impressing on loan so will serve as backup to Hazard on the left.

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This left the squad looking like this and a starting XI that would hopefully look something like below.

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Pre-Season​

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So pre-season went extremely well as we went undefeated and only conceded the one goal through the whole run of fixtures. With all the player sales that went through it became obvious that we didnt need to worry about making money through friendlies and we certainly didnt need to go on any tours so we organised a nice easy run of fixtures to try and help the new players gel into the squad and get the confidence up a bit.

Pre-season stars​

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Eden Hazard has started the new season where he finished off the old one. 5 goals in pre season still make him the main man and one to watch for the coming campaign.











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Cesar Azpilicueta seems to be relishing moving back to his natural right side and has an average rating of 7.78 throughout pre-season. Mr Dependable is one of the players that I managed to convince to stay with the promise of Europe next season and he could be vital for us.









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A goal and 3 assists for Oscar so far as he tries to adjust to playing on the right wing instead of the centre. The winger role seems to suit him quite well and he has secured his spot in the starting XI ahead of Willian for the beginning of the campaign.








Unfortunately Pre-Season was not so great for one man, Cesc Fabregas. In the 2nd pre-season fixture he broke down suffering from knee tendonitis with an expected recovery time of 4 months. This means increased pressure on Barkley, Cook and Wilshere to perform. Worse for Cesc is that his contract expires at the end of the season and on wages of £170k a week, this injury does not improve the chances of him earning himself a new contract.

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Starting XI - Courtois, Silva, Dragovic, Martins Indi, Matic, Cook, Barkley, Hazard, Oscar, Costa.

We were very lucky to get away with this one against newly promoted Reading. Things looked to be just perfect when Ross Barkley curled a memorable free kick into the top corner on his debut to give us the lead and then moments after Oscar slotted a lovely finish in at the near post to double it. Unfortunately the whole thing was thrown into doubt by Nemanja Matic getting himself sent off early in the 2nd half. Reading capitalised on playing against 10 men and Kostas Mitroglou soon gave them hope with a goal back. Our best defensive efforts were then rendered obsolete as Haris Seferovic equalised near the end of the game with a tidy finish. Just as heads were starting to drop, up pops Diego Costa to smash us back into the lead and seal the win. Matic will be sitting out the next few games until he can prove he can be trusted.
 
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Starting XI - Courtois, Silva, Dragovic, Martins Indi, Azpilicueta, Martinez, Cook, Barkley, Hazard, Oscar, Costa.

A poor performance but a good result against Watford. Martins Indi scored the only goal of the game from a goalmouth scramble and then defended admirably along with the rest of the side to shut Watford out and claim the win. As a performance I am really not satisfied as we got dominated in both Chances and Possession.
 
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Starting XI - Courtois, Dasilva, Rudiger, Martins Indi, Manea, Martinez, Loftus Cheek, Barkley, Hazard, Willian, Kramaric.

Well it took extra time but we secured the win over Huddersfield with a highly rotated side. Kramaric had a very good game and scooped the man of the match award for his two goals while Willian grabbed our third. Into the third round.
 
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A few more sales to mark up as some unhappy players depart and we trim some of the fat from the under 21's.

Out.

Mario Pasalic - Derby - £4.8 mil
Andreas Christensen - Real Madrid - £15 mil
Giorgian De Arrascaeta - Napoli - £13.5 mil​

Christensen was unhappy about his lack of first team football and also unhappy that we wouldnt be playing in Europe. Despite me trying to talk him around twice, he was determined to leave so we cashed in on him. Christian Manea will step up from the under 21's to replace him in the squad. Mario Pasalic and Giorgian De Arrascaeta were both just sat in the reserves not doing anything, and with no clear route into the first team for them it was time to part ways. A tidy £32 mil into the bank account for expendable players. This money will not be spent and will be kept in reserve in case the need arises in January.

And with that, the transfer window is closed.

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Starting XI - Courtois, Silva, Rudiger, Martins Indi, Azpilicueta, Martinez, Cook, Barkley, Hazard, Oscar, Costa.

Much better against Crystal Palace as we eventually eased to a comfortable victory. Eden Hazard and Diego Costa had us two goals up within 17 minutes and that pretty much killed off the game. Stevan Jovetic converted a penalty after Jonothan Silva brought him down but it didnt really change the course of the game as Costa added his 2nd of the game mid way through the 2nd half to seal three more points.

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Starting XI - Courtois, Silva, Dragovic, Martins Indi, Azpilicueta, Matic, Wilshere, Barkley, Hazard, Willian, Costa.

Our first defeat of the season in what was probably revenge for me calling them 'golden oldies' last season. Mario Mandzukic scored the only goal of the game early on and somehow we failed to equalise despite the amount of possession we had and the amount of chances we created. Need to learn from this game and move on.
 
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Starting XI - Courtois, Dasilva, Dragovic, Martins Indi, Azpilicueta, Matic, Loftus-Cheek, Barkley, Hazard, Willian, Costa.

Much better and back to the performance levels we should be aiming for. Despite the worrying trend of conceding early goals continuing with a nice Hrgota effort early on, we managed to claim a good win at the Liberty Stadium. A brace for Diego Costa and a 2nd of the season for Eden Hazard was enough to see off the swans.
 
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Starting XI - Courtois, Dasilva, Dragovic, Rudiger, Manea, Martinez, Loftus-Cheek, Wilshere, Solanke, Oscar, Costa.

Once again we managed to get the better of Watford, this time in the 3rd round of the Capital One Cup at Vicarage Road. Again we fielded a heavily rotated side and again we got a good performance with goals from Oscar and Costa sealing the deal and putting us into the 4th round. A debut for Dom Solanke was a highlight as well as a good performance from Jack Wilshere in the advanced playmaker role.
 
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