£20m defender deal a reminder to Chelsea of their transfer mistakes of the past

Marc Guehi yesterday completed a £20m move to Man City, a painful moment for Chelsea fans.

The Blues are on the lookout for a central defender right now – they’re being heavily linked with a move for Jeremy Jacquet of Rennes.

But not only could they have Guehi for a third of the price – they could have had him for free. He came through our academy, and was sold because there was no clear pathway to the first team. It proved to be a terrible decision for the club. Before long both Antonio Rudiger and Andreas Christensen had left, and there was a clear path that Guehi could have taken to first team action.

At that point it was too late – and they never elected to sign him up again.

Guehi sale triggered disaster years of bad defenders

Naomi Baker Getty Images

Since then, the Blues have spent hundreds of millions on central defenders, and have yet to find anyone better than Guehi who they let go for pennies. Their current best option is Levi Colwill, also an academy player but out injured for the season. Then there’s Wesley Fofana, who has missed more games than he’s played for the Blues since signing. Then there’s Trevoh Chalobah – another academy product we tried to flog.

It’s too late to get Guehi back now, but we certainly hope the club have learned their lessons about self scouting and knowing what they have at home before they go out spending money.

In other news…

Thierry Henry was on Monday Night Football last night, where he noted some of Liam Rosenior’s quirks from his time in France.

Jamie Carragher was also on Sky Sports last night, and he had some interesting thoughts of the early innovations we’ve seen from Liam Rosenior as Chelsea boss, calling them unique.