The Mason Mount transfer saga quickly descended into a sort of information war, with both teams involved briefing heavily, and Chelsea fans either pro or anti Mount twisting the facts to suit their agenda.
Those who hate him won’t be persuaded otherwise – and even the best source won’t get them out of their dedication to believing it was all his fault.
But the well connected Ben Jacobs chose today to declare some of the indisputable truths of the matter:
Mount was not offered a deal after the season ended. In fact, the only offer made after the World Cup was a one year deal.
Chelsea and Mount had made progress (close to a full verbal agreement) on a long-term deal last year. Behdad Eghbali and Todd Boehly both involved in talks. But after the World Cup, a formal one-year extension was offered instead. Paul Winstanley took over talks.
— Ben Jacobs (@JacobsBen) July 5, 2023
The club and Mount had been close to agreeing a new contract when Todd Boehly and Behdad Eghbali were involved. When Paul Winstanley took over after talks around Christmas, all the work on that previous agreement was lost, and from that point we never offered a multi year deal again.
It’s a mess, and there’s still plenty of room for interpretation within those facts, but those are the realities of the situation. There was a deal on the table, it was taken away and replaced by a much worse one. Mount didn’t want to accept the worse one. You can call him a traitor if you like – but what would you have done in that situation?
Perhaps Winstanley’s hardball will turn out to be genius. So far it’s seen us lose a popular and important player for a discount price, so it’s not looking too clever thus far.
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