Ornstein: Chelsea have “regrets” from January after window leaves team weakened | OneFootball

Chelsea’s January window looks more and more like a failure in hindsight. The fact that injuries have caught up with us since then, that our goalkeeping situation remain a disaster and that results have continued to wobble since then makes it pretty clear that more should have been done.

David Ornstein, the Athletic’s top football insider, admitted as much when writing about it last month:

“Yes, there has been a disappointing fall-off and perhaps some regrets from the January window – but Chelsea are now back in the top four and their next couple of games should bring progress in Europe and the Premier League….”

Well we did progress in the Conference League, albeit despite playing pretty poorly in both games. We also got a win against Leicester, although we played terribly there too and then lost to Arsenal at the weekend. Those results hardly convinced anyone that January had been a success. We doubt they cleared up any regrets.

Chelsea project still on track insists top insider

Todd Boehly and Behdad Eghbali watch Chelsea. (Photo by Mike Hewitt/Getty Images)

But Ornstein still insisted that Chelsea were happy with how things were going overall, and also told fans to be more patient in assessing the project’s progress. He pointed out that a lack of experience in the first team wasn’t necessarily a problem, and that other projects have shown one can win without older players:

“I get the frustration on a perceived lack of experience, but many successful teams have shown experience doesn’t necessarily mean older players and you only build experience by playing,” he pointed out.

As if as a direct response to an underwhelming January, the Blues have already locked in two transfers since, with youngsters Dario Essugo and Geovany Quenda set to join from Sporting CP in the future.