Morgan Rogers has opened up on the thinking behind his move to Chelsea after a prolonged link with Arsenal and a record transfer from Aston Villa.<\/p>\n
After completing the exit from Villa, Rogers told the club\u2019s official website that Chelsea stood out to him above the rest. \u201cI\u2019m so excited,\u201d he said. \u201cFor me, Chelsea are the biggest club in London and a club I\u2019ve always admired since I was a kid.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m really excited about the project with the new manager, the players we\u2019ve got and where the club is heading. That\u2019s why I\u2019m here and I can\u2019t wait to get started.\u201d<\/p>\n
The comparison with Arsenal is unavoidable. Arsenal finished as top-flight champions and also reached the Champions League final, where they lost to Paris Saint-Germain on penalties. Chelsea, meanwhile, were beaten in the round of 16 by PSG and will not feature in Europe after missing out on qualification.<\/p>\n
Yet Chelsea had one major advantage in the chase for Rogers: Xabi Alonso. The player said his conversations with the manager were central to the decision. \u201cI\u2019ve had a few conversations with him [Alonso] and I think it\u2019s important for me to be here that I need to understand what the manager\u2019s like, how he is and how he wants to operate,\u201d Rogers explained at his unveiling. \u201cIt very much fits with the way I see the game, the way I want to play, and the way I want to be me, and be free and express myself. Him being a part of that was a massive factor in me being here.\u201d<\/p>\n
Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta also made contact, according to The Athletic, but the deal moved on financial lines. The Premier League winners were not willing to go beyond $107 million, while Chelsea\u2019s $157 million offer was accepted after Aston Villa reportedly gave Arsenal a chance to respond and they declined.<\/p>\n
Rogers also now has the prospect of joining up with Cole Palmer. \u201cI\u2019ve known Cole since I was about 14, first in the England [youth] teams and then when we were both at Man City together,\u201d the 23-year-old said this week.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Rogers chose Chelsea after Arsenal interest, citing Alonso and the club\u2019s project.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":17922,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[192,711,190],"tags":[944,1629,1759],"class_list":["post-17923","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arsenal","category-aston-villa","category-chelsea","tag-andrey-santos","tag-arsenal-captain","tag-arsenal-transfer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17923","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17923"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17923\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17922"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17923"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17923"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17923"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}