Mihajlo Mudric joined Chelsea in January 2023 after we decided to hijack his move to Arsenal at the last minute.
There was a lot of hype around his arrival and the club made a lot of briefings about how highly they valued the winger. I thought the reveal at Stamford Bridge was strange. He wasn’t the guy yet. Maybe he will be, but he wasn’t when we signed him. Pedro Neto was revealed, but Moudric wasn’t there. The hype didn’t make things better.
To be honest, we haven’t seen anything like that yet (which is why Chelsea rate him so highly). There have been a few glimpses, but even Mudryk admits we haven’t seen his best.
When we signed him I was not sure and I was vocal because I thought the money should have been spent elsewhere. I would be really happy if I was proven wrong about these things because it would be in Chelsea’s best interest. But unfortunately, at least for now, I have been proven right on this issue.
But will I eventually be proven wrong? Mudryk thinks so and hopes he is right.
“People haven’t seen the best of me,” Moodrick said this week.
“There’s still a lot of work to be done. We work hard on and off the pitch. Sometimes you want something so badly, but it only happens when the time is right.”
“You can try too hard, so you have to find a balance between that and not trying at all. If you find that balance, you will succeed. I am sure that over time, you will see the best version of yourself.”
I really hope this happens. I really do. He seems like a lovely person and we all know what he’s been through in his life, coming from war-torn Ukraine.
Look, he’s not a bad player. We know what he can bring. He can score decent goals, he can be fast for days, he can beat players. But he lacks confidence, he lacks football intelligence. And sometimes, he just lacks quality. He’s incredibly inconsistent and hasn’t done enough for Chelsea to be successful in two seasons so far. I’d be happy if he were sold tomorrow. I think so. I think we can easily upgrade him, and we’ve already upgraded with Pedro Neto.
Mudryk’s first season was a waste of time as he joined in January and of course he needed time to adapt. It was also another quite turbulent time for our club.
He failed to thrive last season, and given how poor Chelsea have been overall (excluding their last eight games), Mudric has not been productive.
So what I’m asking everyone is, how much time should we give him? To say that ‘with time’ we’ll see the best of him doesn’t fill me with confidence.
We are a Chelsea team that needs success now. This season. We need Champions League football. Everyone has seen it and knows what the financial impact will be if we don’t get it. So we can’t afford to wait ‘over time’. Not because I’m a spoiled fan, it’s just a fact.
I want to give every player a chance to succeed at Chelsea, but we need results and we need to pay for the players. To be honest, we paid too much for Mudrik at the time.
I think it’s now or never for Mudryk. We need to see VAST improvement right now. If not, we have to sell him in January. I think. I would have loaned him out this summer because I haven’t yet written off his fee and made a profit on him, and also, why not? Maybe the pressure will be off and he can show what he can do and become the player Chelsea think he is? I would have definitely given him that chance. That might actually be the answer. But at this stage, I don’t think it’s likely.
