Clearlake Capital

So stay tuned for that.

But today's show is going to focus on Clearlake, the Times investigation that was released last night that a company controlled by Clearlake offered Premier League tickets to UK customers at several times face value and took a commission on each sale.

There's so much to get into here.

The hypocrisy, how truly terrible it looks.

This is not Todd Bowley and Vivid Seats.

So this is not talking about Bowley, who's obviously now left Chelsea.

This is directly talking about a company that is owned by Clearlake.

There is a little bit of nuance in the situation, but there's no getting around how truly atrocious it looks for Clearlake, for Bela Ligbali, for Chelsea's ownership, especially when you factor in how strict or at least the purported sort of strictness of Chelsea's new ticket policy and how they're trying to clamp down on ticket touting and all of that stuff.

The headline is, Chabi Alonso's overthinking isn't helping a Chelsea side already defined by muddled thoughts.

The piece kind of looks at the buddled construction of our squad, the confused nature of Clearlake slash Blueco, that whole error and this whole error and the many things that we've addressed a number of times and are not wrong, but how actually Tabby Lonzo coming in as manager hasn't actually simplified things enough yet and kind of there are things that he does tactically that are maybe hurting our progression and being able to settle into games enough which I think was quite interesting he writes here in that chaotic end-to-end first half Chelsea consistently lost possession in the middle of the park leading to quick United transitions then quick Chelsea counters back the other way hence the carnage because Palmer's position meant the passing lanes weren't open Chelsea lacking depth or verticality could not pass forward in an orderly fashion and therefore could not maintain a And he brings up the fact that if you look at the Premier League game so far, over nine Premier League games so far this season, Alonso has used six different combinations in defence and five different combinations of a two-man midfield.

He brings up the fact that, you know, Barco and Henderson was a pivot in the loss at Brentford.

And there was the stranger strikeless 4-4-2 in the loss at Tottenham that we all criticised.

Well, I'm wondering if it's just come down in the San Siro where Troy is because it was a truly awful penalty, wasn't it? And it sort of sums up his Chelsea career.

I think if you're talking about money wasted by Chelsea and their record in the transfer record has certainly not been perfect since Clear Lake Capital came in.

I think he's one of the worst signings, isn't he, for Farnham? They signed him on the back of a serious knee injury.

He got injured.

Indeed, one could conclude that Chelsea's current issues are related to the churn of players and managers over and above anything else.

Ever since Clear Lake Capital took over the club, the one thing that the West Londoners have lacked is continuity, and it stands to reason that having to keep starting again is going to have an effect on results and performances.

Alonso has proven himself to be a manager of some standing, and to be just one win away from completing an unbeaten treble-winning season with Bayer Leverkusen is an incredible achievement.

Though the Spaniard would be the first to admit that things didn't go according to plan at Real Madrid, there were certain mitigating circumstances which ultimately ended with the manager being the fall guy.

That feels very Chelsea over the last four years.

And I think that's why many people will react to games like this in a more negative fashion than some people would want them to, right? Because it's the baggage of the last four years that is brought onto every new incumbent under Clearlake.

Like that is the reality.

Like Xabi Alonso, just like Liam Rossignol before him, inherits all of the problems, all of the false dawns, all of the broken promises, all of the compounding failures.