"The management told me" - New Chelsea signing makes bold claims about club's poor end to last season

Chelsea right-back Malo Gusto was signed in January 2023. He was loaned back to Lyon for the rest of the season before returning as a first-team squad player under Mauricio Pochettino for the 2023-24 campaign.

The Blues have signed a flurry of young players, including Gusto (20), since new owner Todd Boehly took over in the summer of 2022. They have spent north of £1 billion, but the results on the pitch have been shockingly poor.

The Blues finished 12th in the league last season, garnering only 44 points and scoring 38 goals. Gusto has now said that he was aware of the transition phase the club would have to go through while signing for the Blues.

"Before signing for a big club like Chelsea, you think and inform yourself of the situation," he told RMC Sport.

"I wasn’t necessarily surprised. The management told me that it was a long-term project that could take time to get going. Little by little, with the team, we are trying to create a real group that will move forward together to put Chelsea back to where it should be and win everything."

Chelsea have made a poor start to the new season. too. They're 11th in the standings, with 11 points on the board after eight gameweeks, but have won their last two league games.

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Has the abrupt squad overhaul left Chelsea without any cohesion?

Chelsea became one of the better performing clubs across Europe since the takeover by Roman Abramovich. They had finished third in the league, made it to the FA Cup and Carabao Cup finals, and won the UEFA Super Cup and Club World Cup in the final full season of the Abramovich era.

The drastic drop in form and performance level since that season can be attributed to many reasons. New owners learning the ropes, managerial changes, unsettling nature of the takeover, major personnel changes in the boardroom are attributable. However, one big reason that can also be looked at is the massive squad overhaul.

The Blues have signed 32 new players and moved on 35 since Boehly took over in the summer of 2022. It's an astronomical number for any club to maintain balance in the dressing room and build chemistry on the pitch with the players seemingly going through a revolving door every window.

The league performances are a good indicator of the poor impact the transfer influx has made on the pitch, with the Blues amassing 55 points in 46 league matches.