By Football Talk.
Chelsea Chief Executive Ron Gourlay has said that the club would like to remain self sufficient and fund any player purchases with money raised from selling their existing stars. Gourlay also claims Chelsea will not be drawn in to any bidding wars with rivals clubs for players this summer whilst denying that they have an old squad.
Speaking after Chelsea secured the premier league title yesterday, Gourlay was quizzed about whether they will look to bring in some fresh young talent after accusations about their squad being too old, but the Chief Executive was clear that he didn’t feel the team was too old and made it clear that Chelsea would not be forced in to paying over the odds this summer.
“No – we wouldn’t get involved a bidding war. If there’s any player that has become available and we feel they can strengthen our team then it will be on the terms of Chelsea FC.
“We’ve got to be respectful to the rest of the players in the pool and as we mentioned we have some great players coming through from the academy, so the future’s bright.”
He went on: “But I keep hearing about our ageing squad – we have 28 players in our first team squad and our age average is 27 – so I hope people are not telling us we’re too old at 27. I think we’re in a good position.”
Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich has been expected to loosen the purse strings this summer and hand Carlo Ancelotti a sizable transfer fund to make 2-3 key investments in the team, with the likes of Aguero, Pato and Higuain all being touted as potential targets and all with hefty price tags. However, Gourlay has insisted the club would like to remain ‘self sufficient’ and would prefer to make any signings with money raised form player sales, but did say that funds would be made available if the right player became available at the right price.
“If the right player is available that Carlo wants to bring into his squad and if it fits with everything else then we’ll bring him in.
“The money will be there but we’ll stick to our goal of being self-sufficient and that’s very, very important.
“From a business point of view it would be nice to finance any new signings coming in from players that may be going out or selling players.
“But at the end of the day we’ve got to keep our goal of being self-sufficient but if we have to go into the market place then if it’s the right player to strengthen the team, then the answer to your question is ‘yes’.”
