Enzo Maresca’s pose matched the content of what he was going to say.
Furrowed brows, chin resting on clenched fist, eyes downcast towards the press conference table — the new Chelsea head coach was the spitting image of Auguste Rodin’s famous sculpture The Thinker as he philosophised on the impact that he felt the Premier League’s profitability and sustainability rules (PSR) had made on Chelsea’s academy pipeline.
With youth graduate Conor Gallagher possibly moving to Atletico Madrid, this is the second successive season, after Mason Mount 13 months ago (and arguably Lewis Hall), in which a first-team player developed at Cobham has left the club.
Newcastle United, one of Chelsea’s rivals for European qualification next season, are attempting to sign Crystal Palace centre-back Marc Guehi, another former Chelsea product. This season, between Guehi, Hall and Tino Livramento, 75 per cent of Newcastle’s starting defence may be former Chelsea players. Over the past three seasons, Chelsea have spent around £265million ($336m) on defensive reinforcements.
So it is fitting that the model for The Thinker — boxer Jean Baud — later appeared on a Swiss banknote. Maresca’s comments may have been framed as a squad-building morality tale, but the reality is inescapable — this is about money (and the inability to simply print it).
Asked on Monday evening on Chelsea’s U.S. tour whether he was concerned about the exodus of players from the club’s academy in recent seasons — as well as Gallagher, Mount, Hall and Omari Hutchinson, Armando Broja and Trevoh Chalobah could still depart this summer — Maresca replied with a look of long-sufferance that does not usually appear in Chelsea managers for at least another two months.
Gallagher is expected to leave this summer, while Guehi could join two other former Chelsea academy players at Newcastle (Eddie Keogh – The FA via Getty Images)
“But this is not Chelsea’s problem,” he argued. “These are the rules. All the clubs are compelled to sell players from the academy because of the rules. It’s all of the Premier League clubs’ problems.”
Asked whether the club were still committed to producing first-team players, Maresca replied: “Absolutely. The intention of the club is not to sell players from the academy, but it is the rules that you have to do it. It’s not only us; it’s all the Premier League clubs. It’s a shame because in Italy we have Francesco Totti at Roma, 20 years with the same club.
“A one-club man — we love that in football; the fans want to see that. But with the rules now, it is different from the past.”
Does the Premier League need to change those rules?
“If they want to protect academy players,” Maresca said, “then probably yes.”
The issue is what they need protecting from. Is it the league? Or is it the squad-building strategy of their own club?
It is refreshing to have a Premier League head coach engage in the detail of these questions — even if it also highlights how the lack of access provided by all clubs to sporting directors, the individuals ultimately responsible for these decisions, is laughable.
The Italian is right that Premier League clubs should be able to retain their young talents — it is good for the fans, good for the clubs and good for the league. Loyalty, going both ways, is what builds brands. And if, at its heart, football is a game of hope, the idealised version of a supporter’s dream involves an academy player scoring the goal that delivers a trophy.
But this is not a case of Chelsea having their academy players prised from their fingers — it is one where they are being actively pushed towards the exit door so they can prise academy players from the fingers of other clubs. Look at Chalobah, left out of the club’s pre-season tour squad last month, or Broja, offered around the Premier League over the past 12 months. Among academy products, only club captain Reece James and defender Levi Colwill appear safe from the exodus.
Chelsea have spent more than £1billion on players since Todd Boehly and Clearlake Capital took over the club in May 2022. This is why they need to sell academy players. It is due to the sheer scale of their spend and not because of Premier League machinations.
The key number here — that clubs are not permitted to lose more than £105million over a three-year cycle — has been known for more than 10 years. These PSR regulations are not new — though there is a feeling at the Premier League that criticism along Maresca’s lines has become in vogue. The perception is that clubs keen to spend more than PSR allowed have seized on an emotive topic — youth academy production — to pressure the Premier League into allowing them to do so.
Chelsea have spent heavily in recent years on players such as Moises Caicedo (Darren Walsh/Chelsea FC via Getty Images)
Even aside from the question of whether Maresca is right, his comments show what Premier League clubs are thinking.
And this is what is new — teams being willing to go quite so close to the line with their spending. The margins are so tight in the Premier League that this appears to be a prerequisite for competing.
Of the past 11 Premier League winning seasons, just one year — Liverpool in 2019-20 — involves a club not currently being investigated for allegedly breaking spending rules.
Those charges are contested and not all sides are breaking the rules — but legal and financial departments are exploding as teams try to keep pace. Some clubs appear set on finding loopholes to keep spending. The realisation that selling youth players provides an outsized PSR benefit (because they bear no amortised cost) can be viewed in this context.
The Premier League is set to introduce new financial fair play rules — comprising of a squad cost cap (which is already operated by UEFA, European football’s governing body) and anchoring (where spending is linked to the revenue of the league’s bottom club) — but these are not expected to change the landscape of academy player sales. Under these owners, and adhering to these rules, Chelsea’s direction appears set.
“It is not only Chelsea spending money on players,” said Maresca on Monday. “It’s all the big clubs trying to try and buy players. Some of the clubs spend more, some spend less.”
This summer, Emile Smith Rowe’s £27m move to Fulham was driven by the PSR boost that the sale of a fringe player would offer Arsenal’s transfer budget. Similarly, the exit of Geordie midfielder Elliot Anderson to Nottingham Forest for £35m (a fee significantly offset by the move of Odysseas Vlachodimos in the other direction) only occurred because of Newcastle’s desperation to avoid a sizeable breach of Premier League rules.
Only a small number of youth academy sales are the transfers questioned by Maresca and fans alike. Nobody is upset when these are not first-team players — their sales are actively encouraged, and seen as a sustainable way to finance the club. City’s sales of Taylor Harwood-Bellis and Tommy Doyle this summer (after a year away on loan) for a combined £25m did not see sky-blue hordes march on the Etihad Campus — but they did help pay towards the arrival of right-winger Savinho.
Like City, Chelsea have been good at making player sales. The issue is the scale of arrivals. “Some clubs spend more, some spend less,” said Maresca. Chelsea spend more.
There is a limit to how long this accounting can help. Selling the jewels of your academy is a loophole, but it is a loophole in the same way that Daedalus and Icarus’ waxen wings were a loophole around the laws of flight. It is not a sustainable strategy and will finish with a bump.
Asked the question he was, Maresca had to answer in the way he did. To say otherwise was to criticise his own club’s strategy. Given he has not even managed his first competitive game at Chelsea, his footing is not that firm.
But his answer still deflects. Chelsea willingly flew this close to the sun. They cannot complain if the wax melts, they get burned and they lose a favourite son.
(Top photo: Darren Walsh/Chelsea FC via Getty Images)
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Publish date : 2024-08-06 17:14:00
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