Todd Boehly ‘knew everything’ about Graham Potter well before appointing him as the Chelsea boss this week.
That’s according to transfer insider Fabrizio Romano who has revealed that Boehly asked about the coach when speaking with his former player Marc Cucurella who signed for the Blues back in August.
Thomas Tuchel’s dismissal seemed like a matter of time after a poor start to the season for the Blues, and after letting go of the German coach, who delivered a Champions League title a little over two years ago, the west Londoners moved quickly to appoint Potter.
The speed of the announcement may have come of a surprise but it seems as if Boehly had a succession plan in place all along following Romano’s claims.
Speaking on his YouTube channel he said:
“It’s a long-term project as I told you between Potter and Chelsea, but I wanted to reveal to you a secret story about this.
“The important point is about the meetings that maybe many of you remember about Cucurella deal. It was August, first weeks of August, Todd Boehly decides to jump into the Cucurella deal to hijack the deal with Man City that were really interested.
“In the meetings between the agents of Cucurella and the contacts between Todd Boehly and Cucurella himself, I’m told that Todd Boehly knew everything about Graham Potter.
“So when he was speaking to the player, when he was speaking to the agents, he knew everything about Graham Potter’s ideas. He knew about the system, he knew about the ideas, he knew about the methods, he was absolutely informed on the manager and this is not so usual.
“That was a message that he was already exploring that name. He was already prepared to have some contacts in case the situation was going to collapse with Thomas Tuchel as it happened.
“When he spoke to Cucurella for the first time I’m told that he asked about Potter, how he was feeling, how was the manager. Of course Cucurella always said positive things.
“But it shows how Todd Boehly was working on Potter as a priority since a long time, not since few days.”
While inexperienced at the level of a continental-leading club it is refreshing to see Boehly provide Potter with a chance to show what he can do. Something that can only of scarcely been imaginable under the Roman Abramovich regime.
While the English coach will be familiar with Marc Cucurella’s talents the postponement of fixtures will also give him added time to become acquainted with the rest of the squad as he looks about correcting a stuttering start to the season that has seen Chelsea lose three of their first seven matches.
