Simon Philips of this website was interviewed yesterday on CaughtOffside, and there was plenty of interesting transfer chat related to his work you can read here.
He was asked about Timo Werner of course, and one angle he offered was on the Blues’ struggles to sign top strikers to fill the boots of Didier Drogba and then Diego Costa when they each left.
“Mentality, and past their peak (some of them),” he replied when asked what factors had caused those forward to fail when signed in similar situations in recent years.
“It’s a lot of pressure to lead the line for Chelsea, you’re immediately compared with Drogba and Costa for example, and some players just don’t have strong enough mentalities to cope.”
That was evident in some cases. After a strong stat, Alvaro Morata never looked like he could break out of a downward spin of confidence.
Others like Radamel Falcao, Pato and Gonzalo Higuain were over the hill, as Philips notes. None of them have really done much since, and it wasn’t just Chelsea that was wrong for them – they were definitively done as players.
That’s very much not the case with Werner, and we hope that means he breaks the chain.
