Lose On Purpose: Our Big-Brain Plan to Get Chelsea a New Goalkeeper

Red, White & Blues FC | 4:45 AM Football, a Set-Piece Guru, and a Plan to Get a New Goalkeeper

Chelsea are in Sydney, we are not waking up for it, and Xabi Alonso just gave us a reason to root against our own back line.

Preseason is here, which means Chelsea are on the other side of the planet playing Western Sydney Wanderers at 4:45 in the morning our time. We open by loudly committing to live stream it and then immediately un-committing, which tells you most of what you need to know about how much stock we put in the Sydney Super Cup. But underneath the jokes there’s actually a bit of optimism creeping in this year — a training session that looked like real coaching, a new set-piece coach who might be the best in the business, and a manager saying things a manager is supposed to say. Then there’s the goalkeeper situation, where we land on a plan so stupid it might work.

Australia at 4:45 AM, and Why We’re Even There

The tour is Sydney (Western Sydney Wanderers, then Tottenham), Hong Kong, Jakarta, and Malaysia, with Juventus and AC Milan in there too, a Real Sociedad friendly at Stamford Bridge on August 15, and then the season opener away at Fulham because we are apparently never allowed a home opener. Jason’s read: this is a cash grab with terrible timing, and if BlueCo would just sell the front of the shirt — four years running now — maybe we wouldn’t need to be chasing the Australian and Southeast Asian markets at dawn. Daniel’s more forgiving: let the boys go on tour, do some PR, build rapport with a new manager. We check the weather in all four cities like the professionals we are. We also agree that a Tottenham derby in Sydney is not a derby, because nobody out there is going to hate anybody properly.

Preseason Expectations: Please Just Don’t Get Hurt

Jason’s forecast is bleak and specific — one to five players will get injured, they’ll be pivotal, and the transfer strategy hasn’t accounted for it, because it never does. Daniel finds the silver lining: minutes for the academy lads, Levi Colwill getting his legs back, Cole Palmer maybe getting going, and Estêvão on the pitch. We’re missing Caicedo, possibly Enzo, Reece James, Morgan Rogers, and Geovany Quenda, which limits what anyone can actually learn. The bar is simple: don’t lose to Western Sydney Wanderers, don’t lose to the side in Jakarta. Lose to Tottenham, Juventus, or Milan and fine, we’re learning a new system. And if there is one prayer we’re saying out loud, it’s that Estêvão comes home in one piece.

Austin MacPhee Is Here and He’s a Glorious Bastard

The genuine highlight. Chelsea have hired Austin MacPhee from Aston Villa, the Scottish set-piece specialist who also works with the Portugal national team, whose Villa side outscored every club in Europe’s top five leagues from set pieces in 23/24 and finished joint-top with Arsenal in the Premier League last season — the difference being Arsenal shat their way to it and MacPhee does it properly. If this podcast has one recurring complaint over four years, it’s Chelsea set pieces. We once lost our minds over a short corner under Pochettino. Hiring an actual set-piece guru, rather than another motivational coach imported to install a “winning mentality,” is the single clearest sign that somebody at the club is taking this seriously. Daniel is now on a mission to find MacPhee’s Twitter, ask him his favorite scotch, and get him on the show. Austin, if you’re listening: there’s also Miller Lite, and you look like a Miller Lite guy.

The Goalkeeper Plan (Root Against Your Own Defense)

Xabi Alonso has said everything is open, every position, and per Ben Jacobs on the CFC Hub he’s asked the club for time to assess the keepers in preseason before making a recommendation. Which leads Daniel to the big-brain question: shouldn’t we then want to ship a load of goals in Australia? Jason is fully on board — a preseason loss tells you nothing about the club, but it tells you plenty about the goalkeeper. So, Levi and Josh, do us a solid and let a few in. Underneath the bit is a real argument we go back and forth on. Robert Sánchez is a genuinely excellent shot-stopper — 95 saves, nine clean sheets, statistically a better shot-stopper than Mike Maignan, in a harder league — and the 47 goals conceded says as much about Wesley Fofana’s pace, Tosin’s one-v-one defending, and Mamadou Sarr as it does about him. But he can’t distribute, he can’t play with his feet, and every manager keeps asking him to do exactly that. There’s a £60m keeper with a release clause sitting there in Diogo Costa who does both. Pay it, keep Penders, and let us stop holding our breath every time the ball rolls back.

Estêvão vs. Yamal, and the Photo We Refuse to Believe

We close on the good stuff. Alonso on Estêvão: “plays with the confidence of someone who’s been in Europe for years — age means nothing when the talent is that special.” We both think this is his breakout year and the hype only grows. Jason rates him above Lamine Yamal for one reason: humility. The only off-pitch photos of Estêvão are of him in church; Yamal’s are from the club. Not a moral judgment, just a pattern — Messi didn’t live that way, Ronaldo didn’t live that way, and Daniel’s comparison point is Neymar, all that talent shadowed by off-pitch noise and injuries. And speaking of Messi, we are not letting go of the bathtub photo. Why did nobody see that image until the World Cup? We’re calling AI, we’re calling gaslight, and we’re calling for a whole midweek episode of football conspiracy theories where we take turns dragging each other down the rabbit hole.

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