@Lodatz: The thing is he first completed his medical at Tottenham but changed his mind right before he could sign a contract. If he completed the medical then he did not fail it. By the way, mad respect for not being mad. A lot of Spurs fans are mad right now.

@Alex: Rooney will join after the United game. Just wait and see :)

@Vendetta: "The thing is he first completed his medical at Tottenham but changed his mind right before he could sign a contract."

Well, says who? (and yes, I am slightly yanking your chain, but, bear in mind that everything written has been pulled from someone's backside)

;)

As for not being mad: meh, it's okay. I think those fans are just upset that it was Chelsea, and this DOES seem like a deliberate FU from Mou/Roman to AVB/Levy. Either way, I truly consider it a bullet dodged.

Now, if this was Erik Lamela... I'd be reaching for my shotgun. >:)

@Lodatz: I think it was a great signing for Chelsea and I think Willian is a great player. Also, he is a huge upgrade over Moses. People talk about how this completely destroys our midfield and that we buy too many midfielders, but its not true. For every starter in the band of three, we now have a back up for them and they are great back ups too.

Hazard (LW) - Back up: Schurrle/Willian
Oscar (AM) - Back up: Kevin de Bruyne/Willian/Schurrle(/Rooney?)
Mata (RW) - Back up: Willian/Schurrle
Marin (most likely will be sold)
Moses (will go on loan this season)

Great bit of business by Chelsea but I must admit, he is a tad bit overpriced. All that's left now is Rooney.

We shall see. :)

I just will have a lilywhite handkerchief ready for later in the season when you get the sniffles over how good Willian ISN'T.

O:)

@V "I think it was a great signing for Chelsea" Wait... What!? Did we sign him already?? lol

I think 30m is too much for him..also does he want to be backup in a worldcup year where getting into a Brazilian team will be tough as anything.

^ Yeah? What about Fernandinho's £30 million? and he is 28 years old while Willian is 25 :)

Yes he was overpriced as well, that doesnt make Willian a good buy, next you will start using Andy Caroll as a benchmark. Also Shaktar werent having a fire sale.

^I agree with you that he is overpriced but I think people are judging the price based on reports. He could be much cheaper than we think. Lets just wait until Chelsea announce the actual signing to see the price. Also, fire sale or not, Anzhi will definitely want to profit on some of their signings still. Also, he obviously isn't going to just sit and rot on the bench at Chelsea. He will play over 20-25 games every season. Plus, he wasn't going to beat Lucas, Neymar, Oscar, Hulk or Coutinho to the World Cup squad really. It's obvious he is aiming for money.

Willian and Fernandinho are a very talented players there is no doubt about that. as for the 30m, I think It's the players average price nowadays. Shakhtar played a very beautiful football with them.

Why are Chelsea signing another Midfielder? Marin went out on loan right?

^Because we need good quality midfielders for rotation/back-up. Marin went on loan and will probably be sold and Moses will go on loan this season as well.

You know this stage Madrid are building, to supposedly unveil Bale? I would literally piss myself laughing if they unveiled Willian instead...

If those are the 3 advanced mids you mentioned above, does chelsea play with 2 DM's or 2 strikers?

You'd have Lampard/Essien/Van Ginkel/Mikel/Ramires for the DMish role and if you buy Rooney then Ba, Rooney, Torres and Lukaku for the striker. One category of these players will have to fight for a single spot which seems excessive doesnt it?

@Fred: For the pivot (2 holding mids) we have Essien, Ramires, Lampard, Van Ginkel, Mikel and De Bruyne. Lampard and Essien are old so they wont play too many games. Van Ginkel is still 20 and new to the EPL meaning he wont start most of the games either. Mikel isn't our best option meaning he wont play that much either. Ramires is a CM but we need a DM next to him (Essien, Mikel). And Kevin De Bruyne prefers to play upfront. Clearly there will be enough rotation and time for the pivot players.

As for the strikers. It's clear that when we sign Rooney, one striker will most likely leave. Obviously it will be Ba as Torres's wages are too much for any team. Meaning we go back down to the Rooney, Lukaku, Torres. Which is perfect for us.

@Vendetta, what makes you think Chelsea will sign Rooney? Is it something that the rest of the world doesn't know or is it just pure wishful thinking on your part? Rooney isn't going to Chelsea. Your team has a better chance signing Falcao for the second time this summer.

So far it's wishful thinking but we'll see what our chances are with Rooney after the United game ;)

I just read a Chelsea article that discusses why we bought Willian and the writer's answer makes sense for why we snatched him from Tottenham.

"Fernando is a striker, nobody has doubts about it, but I think he's a striker more comfortable when he has space behind defenders. He has it more difficult when opponents are very close, when opponents are compact and when he has to play in small spaces."

"He's more a player to go into a space than to play with the ball at his feet."

These are Mourinho's statements on the striker dilemma in July. Clearly Mourinho wants a player that can link-up well, finish and is able to play with the ball at his feet. For the past month and a half it seemed Rooney was the number one target and even Mourinho said "Rooney or bust." But I guess he wasn't telling the truth.

Speaking ahead of his side’s game against Aston Villa at Stamford Bridge tomorrow, when asked by journalists about whether there was a Plan B over signing new players, the Chelsea boss replied: 'and C.'

This is where the article comes in:

"As far as I'm concerned, the key requirements from the Plan B are as follows:
1) Long-range shooting

2) Contribution to the short, quick passing interchanges with Hazard, Mata, Oscar et al
3)Enough of a scoring threat to force defenders to track him

Fortunately, there is already somebody that is (in my opinion) particularly strong in all of these areas and already on the roster. I think the ideal Plan B could very well be Andre Schurrle."

"The Willian signing also makes more sense in the context of a position change for Schurrle. Moving Andre to CF leaves a good rotation of Hazard, Willian, De Bruyne and Moses on the wings and Mata and Oscar at #10. This is, of course, entirely speculation, but I think Mourinho could do a lot worse than adding Schurrle to the mix if he can't get hold of Wayne in the next week."

It makes the MOST sense, however, in just pissing off AVB and depriving Tottenham of a player they wanted.

Seriously, he mental gymnastics required for this to make sense for footballing reasons tell you everything you need to know. Mou is just being Mou, and starting the mind-games early.

But I'm sure that won't stop Chelsea blogs from endless reams of speculation as to 'where he will fit in', even though the simple, obvious answer is: he won't, and he wasn't intended to. ;p

You make it seem as we did this to just piss off Tottenham. We have been after Willian since 2 years ago. Way before Levy even thought of buying him. How could you say that we actually used 30 million for a player just to stop Tottenham from buying him. No owner in the world would do such a thing.

You see this as a transfer to just rob Tottenham of a better chance to challenge for the title but it seems your mind is being fogged by random assumptions on why we bought him, possibly because we snatched him from you right before he could sign a contract.