Top players we missed out on signing this transfer window

The summer transfer window has come to an end finally two days ago and Chelsea were involved in it very much. The return of Jose Mourinho brought some anticipations that he was going to overhaul the squad with big name signings and some key departures such Juan Mata, Fernando Torres and David Luiz to name a few. But, thankfully the Special One didn’t see making big bold decisions early on as the solution to improve a team which was short in depth and inconsistent all season long last year.

Mourinho kept saying he will give all his players chances to show him what they are capable of including the youngsters who are on-loan at the moment. So, all the fuss and noise surrounding the speculations of Luiz going to Barcelona, Mata joining title-rivals Man Utd or Fernando Torres being surplus to requirements were put to rest at Monday midnight when the clock hit 12:00.

The club did an incredible job on holding on to those key players and Mourinho has improved this Chelsea side just like he said he could. Sometimes last year under Rafa Benitez, it seemed as the squad is almost dead and as if we needed a big overhaul but, the return of Mourinho has proved that was not the case and our team now looks a team to put any of the best clubs in the world to a test no matter who the opponent is.

Let’s get back to our talking point and analyze our summer transfer activity further more. Despite signing some top player with potential in the coming years, we missed out on few top targets who could have really made an impact on us winning big trophies come at the end of the season. Let’s rank this players in no particular order and analyze the solutions….

Wayne Rooney

We will start this list with non other than Rooney. The English forward was the top target for Jose Mourinho and the club started to push through the deal since David Moyes claimed they will only ‘need Wayne in case if Van Persie gets injured’. Transfer speculations surrounding this have been running rampant on whether Rooney was going to hand in a transfer request to join Chelsea or if he was going to stay at Old Trafford.

Those expectations were put to rest after the Man Utd game at Old Trafford where Rooney was greeted like a returning hero at the Theater of Dreams with both sets of fans chanting his name as he clearly stole the show in that big game. It was after the game though that every Chelsea fan calmed their expectations that Rooney will join Chelsea. Jose Mourinho admitted Rooney may want to stay at the club because of the fans reaction and support through out the 90 mins.

It would have a big coup had we signed Wayne Rooney but, that didn’t happen unfortunately. We have to wait and see whether he might be available this January or next summer unless he extends his contract at Man Utd which is highly unlikely.

Isco 

I had hoped for Chelsea to sign this Spanish maestro since January window of last year when I first published my very first article on 360 at this link. Isco has been a revelation last season shining with Malaga as they proved every one’s expectations wrong by making it all the way to the quarter finals of the Champions League.

This past summer, Isco transferred Spanish Giants Real Madrid for a huge fee of £23m. We could have paid the same amount of money to Malaga and allow them to sell for us instead but, instead we had to wait till around the last week of the window to complete the signing of Brazilian Willian for £32m. I am not complaining about our new signing not being good enough but, I personally would have preferred Isco ahead of Willian back in June to complete the transfer.

The Spanish maestro however kick started his season for Real Madrid in an impressive way scoring a winner in their first La Liga game of the season at Bernabeu and added a further two goals last weekend when they beat Athletic Bilbao 3-1 at home. I have high hopes when Willian the same way but, we have to admit Isco’s signature was a big miss.

Edinson Cavani  

This is kind of 50-50 to some but, In my opinion, The Uruguay International would have fired us into League and European trophies by firing in goals in front of the fearsome attacking midfield we have at Stamford Bridge. This deal seemed as if it was going to go through till big spenders PSG stepped in and offered more money to Napoli.

We had the financial resources to oversee this deal but, Jose Mourinho rightfully opted not to pay that huge amount of money for a player we don’t think is worth that much. If we could have been the only club interested, the move could have happened in the last stages of the window with the player having clear intentions to leave.

That was a huge miss as well as Mourinho’s squad is short on firepower despite having a precious group of attacking mids who can assist and lay the ball to a true finisher like Edinson Cavani.

Robert Lewandowski 

This transfer for the Polish hit man was not speculated much as the player had made his intentions to join Bayern when his contract comes to an end in public. But, Jose Mourinho has been a big admirer of his since he scored 4 goals in the first leg of the semi-final match against Jose’s Real Madrid at Signal Iduna Park.

Lewandowski is one of  the top strikers in the world at the moment and his decision of wanting to wait till his contract at BVB comes to an end and then join Bayern next summer is surely a big miss and disappointment for Jose and most Chelsea fans including myself. Let’s maybe hope he will be intent on leaving BVB for another club as well to open the door for the Blues to snap up his signature in January or next summer when he is set to leave Dortmund.

Radamel Falcao 

Another player who is a striker we missed out on. This very much tells the intention and expectation of us, Chelsea fans to have a world class striker signing to boost our attack. This happened very much early in the summer in June when big spenders, AS Monaco announced the capture the Colombian Starts signature to take him to the principality instead of him coming to Stamford Bridge.

Mourinho had admitted before when he was at Real Madrid on how he was interested in having the player but, the rivalry between Athletico and Real blocked the move from happening. The Special One labeled Falcao a ‘forbidden fruit’ in front of the whole media to make his interest clear. Owner Abramovic has been a big fan as well after it was reported he tried to sign Falcao in the remaining days after he scored 3 goals on the Blues in Monaco, the same stadium he currently plays in. He surely is a big miss as he was perfectly suited to spear head our attack and spur us to Premier League and Champions League glories.

Any of this transfers didn’t happen and the others with the exception of Wayne Rooney and Robert Lewandowski have no chance of going through in the coming years as the players had settled at a club with good resource of money and top tournaments to play in. We will see in the coming transfer windows if this players are necessities or just quenching of an ego.