As per multiple reports, Chelsea have decided to activate Tyler Adams’ relegation release clause at Leeds United, and the 24-year-old midfielder (who is the current actual Captain America, incidentally) is now set to undergo a medical today. Chelsea had been in talks over personal terms for the past few days, and it would appear that those are now agreed as well.
Adams’ release clause is, reportedly, a rather reasonable £20m, and his signing is seen as something we wanted to do in addition to going after Moisés Caicedo (or Roméo Lavia?). The Caicedo deal may be getting close as well, and that certainly won’t be at a reasonable fee if it does happen.
In any case, adding more players to a still fairly bloated squad will surely mean more departures for some of the younger players, and we can certainly expect Cesare Casadei and Lesley Ugochukwu to head out on loans. And maybe Andrey Santos, too? Guess we’ll have to wait and see.
One thing is for certain with Adams: Poch will like him very much!
Poch has probably not ever had a player with Adams’s work rate, when healthy, since he came to top flight. It could end up working out that Adams becomes his favorite, because his engine is so immense. After watching our #6’s for the last few seasons, it will be quite striking to see how much more ground he covers, than Kova and J5, for watchers at The Bridge.
For me……Adams is the #6 equivalent of Fikayo Tomori. 90% of the time, (like Tomori), he does the right things and makes all the right decisions. But……(like Tomori)….it’s that 10% of the time that keeps him from being a really top top player on the world stage. Both players share a tendency to play super aggressively, proactive style of defending that when it’s working,…..looks and IS in those moments, world class! But,…..I’m kind of bearish on Adams because of that 10% of his decision making and playing that (like Tomori) costs his teams dearly. A player like Declan Rice is “average” in his skills……..he’s average. But he’s 100% consistent in the application of his “average-ness”…..and that’s why Rice is seen as a 100M player in a league dominated by defensive minutes of play for all but the top club City.
Adams doesn’t have the consistency of a Rice. But he’s also, in moments, not “average” either. He’s a lot more of a risk taker, and this can go either way, depending on who is playing with and especially behind him. At the WC….with the USA he looked pretty good, but he’s got the ever consistent and experienced Ream behind him. We could re-create that with Silva behind him……but it will be very tricky, imho, because both players play a proactive, “get-between-the-player-and-ball” style of 1v1 defending, when they have the time to close on an attacker. Imho, Adams will have to elevate his consistency a great deal to become a permanent fixture in the XI, but it’s an intriguing possibility what could be if he, Silva, and Enzo click in better way than we could imagine?
Hence….a Rice (type) of #6 holding mid is the better foil for Adams to play alongside, than Enzo, imho. Adams (to date) plays best with a holding destroyer who doesn’t take risks, but who is positionally mundane and always covering behind the partner #6.
Could that change?
Yes, perhaps. Poch is a very good individual player “coach”, I think. If anyone can make him more consistent, it’s probably Poch (or David Moyes, which surprised me why West Ham didn’t take him). And as I’ve said, what if? What if he, Enzo, Silva, and (importantly) James……really do “click”? Because as writers point out, Adams isn’t a world class player. But he is one of these players that can make teams a lot better if it “clicks” around him. It’s a risk, but at 20M, not really much of one….
Even if he doesn’t play a lot at Chelsea, I’d lay odds that he’ll stand out in a few matches, to the point of attracting sell-on interest at around 40M from other Prem clubs! So at 20M…….(like many other American players currently undervalued…), it’s a no brainer, isn’t it?
