Xabi Alonso used his first club interview to set a clear agenda for a Chelsea side that has fallen from the heights of recent seasons. He acknowledged the contrast between the club’s trophy-laden history and its current position, and framed his remit in terms of standards, daily work and an urgent push to be competitive.

“It’s a big honor,” he said of his new post. “To be part of this great club that is one of the best in the world, with great success in the last decades. It’s a big privilege to be a part of and now it’s looking forward to the challenge.

“We have challenges, nice challenges, ahead of us, but this is the beauty of the moment.”

Alonso pointed to the recent decline — after last season’s Club World Cup victory over Paris Saint-Germain and the expectation of a title challenge, Chelsea have slid into a crisis with no Champions League football and a fanbase impatient for progress. He made clear his intention to combine respect for what has worked previously with immediate corrective work.

“This is what excites me,” he stressed, “this challenge, this chance to prove that we can do great things, that we can create a solid base to be as competitive as soon as possible. We want to start good in the first years and the first games.

“The way they have, not so long ago, competed on the highest level, gave me assurance that the potential of the team was there, because of the quality of the players, because of the quality of the way they have played. So now, it will be the work to carry on many of the things that they’ve done and to know that we come in a very competitive level, the Premier League , but that’s the challenge.

“I’m sure that, with the commitment of everyone, with, for sure, hard work—that’s a must—and with the quality on the decisions that we have to take, we will be there to enjoy a good season.”

On discipline and daily standards he was direct: “There are football principles that are unnegotiatable,” he stressed. “In football, you need to be willing to pay all the price to compete on the highest level, so you can’t hold back anything. You need to give everything you have for the benefit of the team. And the team is always the most important thing.

“We need to create that culture, which is the process, and the process is on a daily basis here at Cobham, training every day to prepare for when we have to perform in front of our fans. But on the daily basis, we need to be the best and we need to know that the team is the most important.”

When hired in May, Alonso was unveiled as Chelsea’s new “manager,” rather than “head coach.”

Former Liverpool manager Jürgen Klopp has publicly described the lengths the club went to in 2017 when attempting to sign Kylian Mbappé.

“The most expensive non-transfer we [Liverpool] invested in,” Klopp recalled. “We flew from Blackpool to Nice. In Nice, the entire Mbappé family boarded a private jet with five rooms or something. We really went all out.

“Then we flew around in a circle, talked with the family, ate good food … we couldn’t be seen. We flew in a circle. It was fantastic. And then he went to Paris!”

Klopp’s account underlined a clear advantage Liverpool believed it had: Mbappé’s mother and primary advisor, Fayza Lamari, is a known Liverpool fan. That connection was referenced by Mbappé himself when he reflected on the contact between the parties.

“I talked to Liverpool because it’s the favorite club of my mum, my mum loves Liverpool,” Mbappé recalled in 2022. “I don’t know why, you will have to ask her.

“It’s a good club and we met them five years ago. When I was in Monaco I met them. It’s a big club. Of course, it was between Real Madrid and Paris Saint-Germain in the end.”

Ultimately Paris Saint-Germain secured Mbappé, parting with a reported €180 million (around $204 million at the time) after an initial loan arrangement. Liverpool, left without Mbappé, moved in different directions in the transfer market. Klopp had wanted Julian Brandt but the club instead completed a signing for Mohamed Salah from Roma.

Salah went on to enjoy a nine-year tenure at Liverpool and established himself as one of the club’s and the Premier League’s most influential players. The transfer choices of that summer remain a clear example of how a single result in the market can reshape a club’s trajectory.

Jersey exchanges are one of soccer’s most visible acts of sportsmanship. Simple in form, they signify respect, admiration and a shared memory from a match. Players at every level trade shirts after games to mark special occasions, noteworthy performances or hard-fought battles.

The practice has deep roots. The first recorded jersey swap took place in 1931 after France stunned England 5–2, when French players asked to keep English shirts as keepsakes. The gesture reached the World Cup stage in 1954 in Switzerland and has since produced some of the sport’s most enduring images.

Historic examples include the 1970 exchange between Pelé and Bobby Moore after Brazil beat England 1–0, a moment that came to represent respect and class. The 1986 swap between Diego Maradona and Steve Hodge followed one of the tournament’s most famous matches; Hodge’s shirt later sold for a record $9.3 million at auction in 2022.

Modern tournaments continue to create memorable swaps. After France’s 2022 World Cup semifinal win over Morocco, Kylian Mbappé celebrated wearing the jersey of Achraf Hakimi. At the 2026 World Cup, Cabo Verde goalkeeper Vozinha swapped shirts with Lionel Messi after Argentina’s 3–2 win and said the moment would stay in his “heart forever.”

Collecting exchanged shirts is an established pursuit. Gerard Piqué has assembled a notable collection that includes jerseys from Messi, Andrea Pirlo and David Beckham. Messi maintains a large personal collection displayed at home, including shirts from Yaya Touré, Raúl, Youssef El-Arabi and Oscar Ustari. Paulo Dybala owns jerseys from Diogo Jota and Ronaldinho and once posted his collection online asking: “How many are there?”

The logistics behind swaps are practical. Players are normally issued more than one match shirt so exchanges are possible; clubs sometimes require players to cover the cost of replacement shirts. Premier League kit managers even coordinate via a WhatsApp group to manage requests between clubs before games.

Not every request is accepted. Cristiano Ronaldo once refused a shirt swap with Robin Gosens. “After the final whistle I went to him, but Ronaldo did not accept,” Gosens wrote in his autobiography Dreams Are Worthwhile. “I asked: ‘Cristiano, can I have your shirt?’. He didn’t even look at me, he just said: ‘No!’.

“I was completely ashamed. I went away and felt small. You know that moment when something embarrassing happens and you look around to see if anyone noticed it? That’s what I felt and tried to hide it.” Gosens later received a Ronaldo shirt from teammate Hans Hateboer.