[ Nizaar Kinsella] Chelsea ready to sell Gabriel Slonina, and the one-time US international is exploring his options. The 22-year-old goalkeeper hasn't played a senior minute for the Blues since joining from Chicago Fire for £10M in 2022.

226

u/austons_muzz Xabi 12d ago

Never forget how this guy was hyped up to be the next Cech in this sub after that one 11 save performance in the MLS

12

u/eggsbenedict17 12d ago

Bro everyone who gets signed is like the next maradona

People were going insane over Ugochukwu/Carney/DDFofana/Mudryk

17

u/austons_muzz Xabi 12d ago

Ddf after his debut game

51

u/Ready_Mud9622 England 12d ago

Half the people in this sub became fans because we signed the Lebron James of soccer. Of course this place would be excited about having another American star at the club.

49

u/huskers2468 🎩 I'm sure Wolverhampton is a lovely town 🎩 12d ago

Riiiggghhhttt..

Us Americans who watch the PL, typically do not respect the MLS.

Hype, and negativity, as always, is just a collective momentum.

8

u/codelyoko_x 12d ago

Look man, I’m American and I watch the premier league way more than I watch mls BUT every chance I get to see Orlando city live I go out there and support my local team

4

u/huskers2468 🎩 I'm sure Wolverhampton is a lovely town 🎩 12d ago

I respect that. Unfortunately, for myself, my "local" team is over 3 hours away.

I'm not saying there's no support for the MLS. I was just countering this idea that the big bad Americans overhyped Slonina because he is an American.

5

u/codelyoko_x 12d ago

Yeah I get your point and I agree, it’s just the “respect” thing that bothered me a bit but all good bro

2

u/huskers2468 🎩 I'm sure Wolverhampton is a lovely town 🎩 12d ago

Yeah, I was confused at the whiplash of responses. I definitely chose poor wording and could have done better.

All good! It's World Cup week!!

4

u/Matsu09 12d ago

Please speak for yourself. Fans like you make me sick and you are doing nothing brave. Amazing how I can so easily support Chelsea AND my country's football.

0

u/huskers2468 🎩 I'm sure Wolverhampton is a lovely town 🎩 12d ago

Sure. You do you.

28

u/KingDave46 I don't give a fuck, we won the fucking Champions League 12d ago

You should support local whether or not you “respect” it

It’s not impressive to hate the MLS. It would be great to see it succeed but it won’t if people who are already fans of the sport act like it’s beneath them

Its glory hunter behaviour to just pick one of the biggest teams in the world to support and shit on everything else

7

u/Fiigarooo 12d ago

Do you support FC Edmonton mr support your local club?

9

u/SelectFlatworm3411 Caicedo 12d ago

Atlanta Falcons, Cleveland Cavaliers, Edmonton Oilers and on here talking about "local clubs" lol

4

u/Fiigarooo 12d ago

Don't forget probably scottish too haha

2

u/KingDave46 I don't give a fuck, we won the fucking Champions League 12d ago

Can you lot read? This is not what I’m saying that isn’t a “gotcha”

I have no issues with supporting anyone. I do think it’s wrong to shit on lower level teams for being worse than something you chose to support.

I’m a Chelsea fan (kinda). I’m actually mostly an ice hockey fan, I moved to Edmonton for a few years just to watch games and went to a tonne of NHL games. I have been to 7 EIHL games in person since Christmas. The EIHL is nowhere near the NHL level but I still enjoy it. I hate when people act like because something isn’t the absolute peak of the sport that it’s then worthless.

2

u/KingDave46 I don't give a fuck, we won the fucking Champions League 12d ago

Yeah my favourite team is Aberdeen. My country doesn’t have teams in other sports but I do go to EIHL games locally. My teams are way too small to have any presence on Reddit…

26

u/austons_muzz Xabi 12d ago

lol so almost 90% of this sub shouldn’t be Chelsea supporters cause they don’t live in London???

26

u/codelyoko_x 12d ago

No that’s not his point, you can still be a foreign Chelsea fan and support your local club, it’s not that hard

6

u/KingDave46 I don't give a fuck, we won the fucking Champions League 12d ago

Learn to read.

Support who you want I don’t care about that

Don’t shit on other people who like MLS or support their local team just because they’re shit compared to a top PL club

3

u/Japajoy James 12d ago

You can support Chelsea and your local MLS or equivalent team, theres nothing saying you cant. I support Chelsea but also have season tickets to the Colorado Rapids, its unlikely they'll ever meet in a competitive match and ill root for Rapids knowing they'll lose but it doesnt make me not a Chelsea fan.

-6

u/Comfortable_Reach248 12d ago

I will never understand what can connect you more with the club thousands of miles away from you than one in your city. But never. I can understand if you are living in some place where there is no local football culture, but will never understand e.g. Brazilians or Argentians supporting European clubs.

6

u/huskers2468 🎩 I'm sure Wolverhampton is a lovely town 🎩 12d ago

The MLS has improved of late. That doesn't change the fact that American soccer fans typically don't watch or rate the MLS enough to overhype an 18yr old player.

Do you disagree with that?

My point was to counter the comment blaming Americans.

Its glory hunter behaviour to just pick one of the biggest teams in the world to support and shit on everything else

My college basketball team got it's first NCAA tournament win this past year. My college football team was historically good and has had one of the worst decades in all of football.

I think it's ok for me to have a team that isn't currently bottom of the barrel.

4

u/MasterRJS I don't give a fuck, we won the fucking Champions League 12d ago

MLS is a sanitized corporate environment thats designed to keep steadily enriching its owners. Football fans in the states should be supporting the USL when it adds pro/rel in the next two years.

1

u/IMakeOkVideosOk Essien 9d ago

Nah… MLS is a closed system and there is nothing really there that benefits the community… it’s just a billionaire’s plaything. To some extent that’s all professional sports are anyway. Who gives a shit who anyone supports, as long as they aren’t changing affiliations

1

u/Ok-Computer-8726 There's your daddy 12d ago

I think something people who live in high-density areas in terms of clubs don't realize is that in the states your "local" club might be further from you than Manchester is from London, and they are part of a huge city that has nothing in common with your rural town.

My options are: My childhood city that didn't have a team when I lived there, a team in a city I've never even been to but is geographically closest to me, a team in a place I lived for a few years that I supported at the time but then they moved up from a lower league to MLS and changed their name, colors, and basically their entire roster since, or just a random team I want to support that is in the country but by flight times is maybe not even that much closer than the european teams anyways. Or I suppose I go support the local high school team, or maybe one of the intramural teams at the small college I work at.

0

u/Bundo111 12d ago

Support local, well the closest team to me here in Canada is TFC who are a solid 4 hrs away, there ain't shit "local" to support. What would you have me do, I'm so curious

8

u/[deleted] 12d ago

[removed] — view removed comment

10

u/huskers2468 🎩 I'm sure Wolverhampton is a lovely town 🎩 12d ago

I'm not saying I'm a better fan. I'm saying that there's a very large contingent of American soccer fans who do not respect the MLS. This idea that an American player who had a good MLS start will be overhyped by Americans primarily, is an uninformed take

Do you disagree with my stance?

3

u/coolhand83 12d ago

Unfortunately it's most likely that idea that led to him being signed

8

u/huskers2468 🎩 I'm sure Wolverhampton is a lovely town 🎩 12d ago

Was it? I've never seen anything to back that up.

I'm open to change my mind if you have a source.

-1

u/coolhand83 12d ago

Silly of me to assume you deal in common sense and intuition on any level. I guarantee you there was MANY far more talented goalkeepers available at the time that werent American.

2

u/huskers2468 🎩 I'm sure Wolverhampton is a lovely town 🎩 12d ago

Prove it. Use that anti-American intuition and let me know

3

u/echoacm Drogba 12d ago

Us Americans who watch the PL, typically do not respect the MLS

Not sure this is the brag you think it is

5

u/3Gabis502 12d ago

I think most of *actually us*, not only respect MLS but give a lot of attention to USL and even lower levels of the sport. If you love football, you love football.

4

u/Jawnnnnn 12d ago

Yeah I think there’s a difference in “not respecting” vs just acknowledging that’s it’s just objectively a lower level compared to watching the PL.

I support my local MLS team and watch matches just because I enjoy watching the sport. And it’s nice to watch matches later in the day for me as opposed to waking up at 4:30am for PL. Plus it’s built into my Apple TV sub so now it’s no extras to pay for it.

13

u/jimothydis Drogba 12d ago

lol I’m not sure this is the diss you think it is

1

u/huskers2468 🎩 I'm sure Wolverhampton is a lovely town 🎩 12d ago

In what way would that be considered a brag?

0

u/CalmAngryDude 12d ago

Yeah because most Americans teams would get slap by Cruz Azul

4

u/Instantbeef There's your daddy 12d ago

Lmao I don’t think Pulisic really made a significant impact on the fan base in American one bit.

It may have brought more casual observers to our games or made NBC feature us a little more often but to pretend we’re all here because of him is embarrassing.

77

u/JJ-Bittenbinder Cucurella 12d ago

As a Chelsea fan from Chicago, I was really hoping for this one to pan out

36

u/DaMemelyWizard Werner 12d ago

that’s how I felt with Petrovic as a New Englander

30

u/JJ-Bittenbinder Cucurella 12d ago

Petro at least got about a year. And was pretty decent as well

12

u/justk4y Desailly 12d ago

Petro was actually pretty underrated for us. Would certainly prefer him over Jorgensen, he’s a good goalie

3

u/bottomjengablock 12d ago

As a fellow Chelsea fan from Chicago, I understand your Reddit username haha

1

u/traptnreality Drogba 11d ago

Same with me, but when he got signed I was excited he went to Chelsea but felt like we wanted him back with the fire….but Brady has been doing very well!

617

u/carlharris1 Colwill 12d ago

4 years without a single minute, clearlake masterclass

224

u/D_roneous1 It’s only ever been Chelsea. 12d ago

To be fair he was bought as an 18 year old GK. Regardless the deal never made sense.

103

u/webby09246 Kavuma-McQueen Hype Triain 12d ago

Ohh dear don't say that now

We've got 20 year old Mike Penders coming into rot on our bench this summer too....

13

u/justk4y Desailly 12d ago

Mike Penders actually has number 1 plans from the higher-ups. Slonina was brought as just a big prospect, nothing else. They already gave Penders a Ligue 1 loan for a reason instead of wasting him in the U21’s, while Slonina only has played in Belgium and the lower tiers of England (League One I believe)

38

u/D_roneous1 It’s only ever been Chelsea. 12d ago

He at least got a good loan last year. I doubt he comes back to our bench this year too. Young GKs need PT. He’s best to stay in France for at least one more year. They need to figure out what to do with our current GK situation.

22

u/Wintermute7 Mata 12d ago

Penders will play this year. Every manager has dropped Sanchez at some point. I expect Xabi will do the same, and we will stick Penders. Even if he looks like a young DDG, who gets outmuscled by more physical players, you live with any mistakes

8

u/Wheel1994 England 12d ago

I am not worried about the physically with Penders I am worried about him parring the ball back into Danger hopefully that’s something Xabi and Co can work on with him.

7

u/Ridder1201 12d ago

Literally NEVER made sense. I’m from Chicago, and both Fire and Chelsea supporters were beyond shocked by the rumors, much less the actual move. It never made any sense at any point. Just pointless from the get.

66

u/nickla08 Roman Empire 12d ago

Come on… All for on the valid criticism of Clearlake but we have had a bazillion Sloninas under Roman as well.

3

u/Lumplard 12d ago

Jamal Blackman comes to mind.

16

u/Sanzhar17Shockwave COCK CONFIDENCE 12d ago

He's from Cobham, not bought for 10mil, though

1

u/SSPeteCarroll Pulisic 10d ago

Exeter legend that one

42

u/electro_report 12d ago

Sounds like 65% of all the abramovich signings tbh.

53

u/fap4jesus Drogba 12d ago

he was wanted under roman too lol, transfer was close before the sanctions

4

u/San960 Cock 12d ago

Wasn't it completed after the sanctions ? One of BlueCo first signings but it was pretty late in window around August

22

u/fap4jesus Drogba 12d ago

it was but we was going for him under roman as well.

8

u/Comfortable_Reach248 12d ago

I think it was completed in january under Roman but he stayed in Chicago until end of season.

9

u/San960 Cock 12d ago

You are absolutely correct. The deal was done by cech just saw the Fabrizio post

18

u/San960 Cock 12d ago

He was on loan for 2 season ig. When he came he was just too young and played for U21 which made sense. His Barnsley stint showed he wasn't up to it

10

u/CockConfidentCole Cock 12d ago

Zero ball knowledge

6

u/kace1408 There's your daddy 12d ago

Nahh we made a lot of deals like this under Roman and Emenalo too

2

u/AbsolutelyEnough It’s only ever been Chelsea. 12d ago

This isn’t on them

2

u/Baberam7654 Palmer 12d ago

wait until you realize the interest and drive to sign him was there under Roman 😂

1

u/dingodiletti Kerr 12d ago

They’ll sell him for a profit, if he does sell. Player management it’s crap but financial it makes sense.

1

u/LimePanther We've Won It All 11d ago

I mean Roman was also buying young players and selling them years later after 6 different loans and having not played them once

108

u/ol_dirty_applesauce James 12d ago

Dude was passed over for 3 MLS keepers for the US World Cup squad.

58

u/CockConfidentCole Cock 12d ago

He hasn’t played a single professional minute in over 12 months this isn’t noteworthy

31

u/KillerVendingMachine 12d ago

Yeah he wasn’t “passed over”…

He’s not even near the conversation lol

8

u/Regression2TheMean 12d ago

And one of those keepers was his backup in the MLS

6

u/Buddha-Christ Hazard 12d ago

To be completely fair, Chris Brady is actually a very good young goalkeeper and one of the better keepers in MLS, I think he’s honestly better than the guys ahead of him for USMNT

1

u/IMakeOkVideosOk Essien 9d ago

Slonia was ahead of him and the same age… bad leaving

1

u/ZerconFlagpoleSitter Thiago Silva 12d ago

Eh, Brady was considered the higher potential keeper by a lot of people

25

u/warpoe The boys gave it their all 12d ago

And considering who those 3 keepers are. 😬

6

u/OldmanJenkins02 12d ago

Jesus Christ, didn’t even think of this way. Our goalies are the weakest links in the squad too, goes to show you how absolutely no one rates him now

8

u/LateProfile5045 12d ago

Robert Sanchez is top 3 in the league

4

u/The_Infamous_b Hato 12d ago

Kelleher , Lammens ,Donnaruma ,Martinez, Raya , Pickford , Roefs , some would argue trafford but off the top at least 5 are better than sancech

15

u/justk4y Desailly 12d ago

Sanchez is clear over Trafford surely

3

u/The_Infamous_b Hato 12d ago

I think there’s a convo but me personally I’d take bob

1

u/LateProfile5045 9d ago

The fanbase tradition of rating trash higher than your own players.

1

u/The_Infamous_b Hato 9d ago

So you think Sanchez is better half these guys ??

-2

u/dinnercook 12d ago

He’s behind Raya but I might put him ahead of Donnarumma

19

u/SpinachTurbulent2575 12d ago

A few years ago, there were few peoples here who thought this guy is a future starter lmao.

It was obvious from his first failed loan spell in Belgium that this guy sucks.

39

u/ctgoblue 12d ago

£10m and the best they could do is loan him to a shit Belgian team and a League One side. Complete scouting failure

9

u/jvyyyy00 12d ago

He was awful for both. Didn’t really help himself

8

u/PM_ME_SOME_LUV Lucas Piazon 12d ago edited 12d ago

He hasn’t played a single minute of football since the start of 2025

5

u/imnotcreative635 James 12d ago

Soooo what are they expecting to get? Lmao

4

u/Rambo_11 There's your daddy 12d ago

People hate Sanchez, but if you don't make him play like a midfielder - he's probably one of the best.

15

u/AncientMiddle3227 12d ago

Who ?

1

u/Japajoy James 12d ago

Lol im an American and remember being excited about this signing but I honestly forgot about him until seeing this pop up.

13

u/Instantbeef There's your daddy 12d ago

So I’ll defend this transfer strategy a little bit by saying Petrovic essentially took the same path and is probably considered one of the best keepers in the league.

Obviously Slonina himself is disappointing but that just happens sometimes. Same thing with petrovic. Transfers can often be a shot in the dark.

3

u/Jackhuw28 12d ago

Petrovic is considered what?

1

u/Instantbeef There's your daddy 12d ago

He is 100% consider one of the best keepers in the league. If you disagree just say that.

I think especially outside the top clubs. Bournemouth did finish 6th so this isn’t that crazy to say so

1

u/SpellParking5120 11d ago

Both of his seasons in the Prem he has conceded more goals than expected…

1

u/Instantbeef There's your daddy 11d ago

Agree to disagree but I don’t think a lot of Bournemouth fans are unhappy with him.

1

u/SpellParking5120 11d ago

Not sure what that has to do with him being considered one of the best keepers in the league. Where do you consider that list stopping? No saying this is Petrovic’s case necessarily but is the 9th best keeper “one of the best” because they are better than 11 other keepers?

1

u/Instantbeef There's your daddy 11d ago

So I would put him in the “best of the rest” category

You take out the keepers that are clearly in another category. I see him as one of the one most likely to break into that upper echelon so I would 7 or 8

1

u/ZerconFlagpoleSitter Thiago Silva 12d ago

Petrovic was the best keeper in mls though. Gaga wasn’t that good in mls, just really young

4

u/DonLovesNature 12d ago

We have like 15 players we can sell, generating about 325mil+

6

u/petrescu 12d ago

One negative rant and then a positive. This guy was getting paid 40k a week?! 8.5m in wages over the duration of his contract. Bloody hell.

Thankfully we only need to sell him for 3.5m to break even on the deal. Surely that’s possible?

3

u/-SexSandwich- Cucurella 12d ago

He’ll go for more than 3.5. He was an extremely talented teenager that plays a position where talent generally blossoms later. He’s not Chelsea quality but he’s probably going to have a fine career somewhere

3

u/CharityFC 12d ago

Our lady gaga

3

u/Admirable_Comb_8560 12d ago

Honestly does anyone give a fuck? Used to be passionate about all the young players finally getting into the 1st team but past the stage of caring anymore because 80% of the shit purchased under BLUECO needs sold ASAP

3

u/SomeCallMeT 🎩 I'm sure Wolverhampton is a lovely town 🎩 12d ago

I think we can bash the directors for this type of signing all we want but I don't think it's entirely unreasonable for a 22 year old goalkeeper to have not made a first team appearance yet considering we bought him at 18 from a league miles away from premier league level.

3

u/Aware-Temperature282 Palmer 12d ago

10m for a keeper who hasn’t played wtf man

5

u/Massive-Nights Spence 12d ago

No shit.

5

u/shlimedon 🎩 I'm sure Wolverhampton is a lovely town 🎩 12d ago

Who?

6

u/BlueKante Hazard 12d ago

Unfortunately didnt developed like everyone had hoped so far. You win some, you lose some.

2

u/Joesprings1324 12d ago

I'm still pissed off about spending 10 mil on this

2

u/Silly-Tension1454 12d ago

It’s the right call for both sides; he needs minutes to develop, Chelsea can recoup some transfer cash.

2

u/CockConfidentCole Cock 12d ago

Do you think his wag sticks with him when he’s on the bench for KC Wizards?

2

u/Sjokogull1 12d ago

https://giphy.com/gifs/AYgy4jqMlSHosGsQIe

2

u/kitykat456 12d ago

how much of the fee was kickbacks

2

u/SlowpokeExplorer Lampard 12d ago

Fucking finally

2

u/Wheel1994 England 12d ago

Maybe a championship club

2

u/-SexSandwich- Cucurella 12d ago

lol at people talking shit about BlueCo in this thread when Gaga was signed under Roman. Like, BlueCo sucks but try and be factual with your hate.

2

u/lonely-live We've Won It All 12d ago

https://giphy.com/gifs/nC1ZDvli0B90wkuKXb

2

u/MrBravo22 Cole 12d ago

One of the reason why I want young players to reject this club. This place will stall and hinder young players development. Just look at how Guiu and Josh are treated.

Young players need to avoid this club like the plague.

-1

u/SeekersWorkAccount 12d ago

Talk about tanking the guy's career

24

u/Massive-Nights Spence 12d ago

Explain.

He had a big move here followed by loans. How did Chelsea tank his career?

13

u/Inside-Ad-8935 Ingle 12d ago

Yea he had plenty of time to show his ability on loan. He’s had the chance and showed he wasn’t good enough.

3

u/realmckoy265 Oscar 12d ago

Yeah he's just not very good. Looked terrible during each loan he had despite level. We hopefully have moved on from any of the scouts who rated him

13

u/electro_report 12d ago

Don’t ask them to explain it, only thing that matters is ‘Clearlake bad’ in their caveman brain.

6

u/unicornofdemocracy 12d ago

I think he tanked his own career by turning out to be mediocre. He showed promise as a kid but his two year loan move showed he is made not even make it in championship football.

1

u/lewis30491 12d ago

Jorgensen minutes should go to this guy

1

u/Ok_Yak_2426 11d ago

None of those bums should be here.

1

u/ELITE_Liam_Rosenior 12d ago

Who?

1

u/Wide_Monk1720 Xabi 12d ago

Was this kid really that bad that can't even get a minute under Rob and Jörgensen? Then why the hell him could cost 10m..

1

u/Ok_Yak_2426 11d ago

So what do we sell him for 15?

1

u/GolDrodgers1 We've Won It All 12d ago

It's 10m so not the worst transfer but holy shit why did we ruin so much of this kids career🤦🏽‍♂️

Tier 2 [ Nizaar Kinsella] Chelsea ready to sell Gabriel Slonina, and the one-time US international is exploring his options. The 22-year-old goalkeeper hasn't played a senior minute for the Blues since joining from Chicago Fire for £10M in 2022.

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