In the battle of the big spenders, only one side really emerged with reasons to further prise open the purse strings. It was a summer in which no other clubs took to the transfer market in quite the same way as Chelsea and Nottingham Forest — with a combined 31 new arrivals and more than £400 million spent — and the pattern is set to continue this month.
On the day David Datro Fofana completed his move from Molde to Chelsea, the 20-year-old forward watched from the stands as his new team-mates struggled at the City Ground. Comparisons could well be drawn between Chelsea’s back four — looking every bit their age, a combined 126 — and Forest’s front line when they stretched their legs.
• Forest expose Chelsea’s identity crisis
Kalidou Koulibaly couldn’t have left without knowing the number on the back of Taiwo Awoniyi’s jersey, given how often he was left chasing it. Another 3½ years remain on the 31-year-old’s contract at Stamford Bridge, yet you cannot quite imagine him being in the starting line-up come 2026. Koulibaly was the intended solution to a problem the new ownership inherited, as Antonio Rüdiger and Andreas Christensen, the core of a Champions League-winning defence, were allowed to leave for free at the expiration of their contracts.
Alongside them was Thiago Silva, the 38-year-old centre back, who Potter’s predecessor, Thomas Tuchel, would compare to Benjamin Button for his seeming ability to defy age. The truth is that Tuchel deployed a formation that screened Silva’s weaknesses, nestling him in a comfortable slot between Christensen and Rüdiger in a back three. Under Graham Potter, Silva has been left exposed in a back four, as he was here.
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The result was another day without a clean sheet: Potter’s defence has managed only one in the past nine games in all competitions. It is no coincidence this has coincided with injuries to Reece James. James’s return from a knee injury against Bournemouth brought a new-found strength to Chelsea’s defence but his departure from that game, due to that same knee, immediately put Potter’s team into regression. César Azpilicueta was given the unenviable task of being asked to deputise for James against Forest, and it was little surprise Steve Cooper’s side constantly attacked on Chelsea’s right.
Azpilicueta is Chelsea’s most decorated player, winning everything possible in his 11 years in west London, yet he might have wished that the much-desired move back to Spain and Barcelona in the summer had happened after seeing Serge Aurier beat him to the ball for Forest’s equaliser. Awoniyi and Brennan Johnson terrorised the 33-year-old all afternoon. Had their finishing been better, Azpilicueta would have surely captained his team to defeat.
Potter is determined not to say it but there is an element of ill fortune, too. N’Golo Kanté’s long-term absence is a problem. His constant running was another factor that screened Silva. Without the World Cup-winner in Chelsea’s midfield, Silva carries the expression of a man caught in the rain without a coat.
Forest regularly found openings on the edge of Chelsea’s penalty area in the space Kanté would often occupy. Bodies were thrown in the way with utter desperation. Had Cooper’s team been better in front of goal, or Morgan Gibbs-White’s volley off the crossbar been an inch lower, another defeat would have piled greater pressure on Potter.
Chelsea are trapped in the space between solving the problems of the present and planning for the future. Wesley Fofana’s arrival from Leicester City for £69.5 million in the summer was a significant outlay and intended to balance the two. Again, injury struck but Fofana had failed to impress in those early weeks. It is little wonder Chelsea are adding Benoît Badiashile from Monaco after agreeing a fee of about £32 million for the centre back and remain in the race for the RB Leipzig centre back Josko Gvardiol.
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Among the many problems Potter faces, plugging the holes in his defence is key. The temptation of the transfer market, to a club unafraid of spending big, will hang over the next four weeks.
