As Chelsea's interest in Everton winger Anthony Gordon baffles fans, especially given the brazenness of a £40m bid - though it is closer to a £25m bid plus add-ons, football.london understands - the age old Cobham debate is one that has come out in force once more.
Should Chelsea be spending vast amounts of money on a player with four league goals and three assists in 51 matches? Especially, some would add, when Callum Hudson-Odoi is still waiting in the wings to be given his own true chance at the club.
Last season the Cobham graduate recorded more assists than Gordon from less than half the amount of minutes, with most of those coming from wingback. The caveat for purely comparing stats is that Chelsea scored 33 times more than Everton last season and that Gordon was a shining star in an otherwise dreadful Toffees team.
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It appears that Hudson-Odoi would like to leave Chelsea this summer, be it permanently or on loan. This could then mean that Gordon would be an effective replacement for Chelsea's 21-year-old player. This only raises the question as to how and why Chelsea have reached the stage with Hudson-Odoi, who has been managed by four managers in the five years since his first team debut, with the Blues unsure of what exactly they have.
Compare that to Gordon and he already has high stock due to his energy, effective pressing and impressive speed. Chelsea fans couldn't say they know the same three biggest pros of Hudson-Odoi's game, especially not as a Premier League regular. Hence, why he wants to push for a move away in order to truly develop his game.
This comes as part of a wider play by Chelsea to fill their ranks with exciting young players this summer. Of their five transfers this summer, two of them have been teenagers and three of them are 24 or under. If you were to add in transfer target Wesley Fofana of Leicester City, then that would be half the new recruits being 21 or under.
To fill up the space there has to be a breaking point and for Hudson-Odoi that time may already have been reached. Not only is he behind Sterling, Mason Mount, Armando Broja, Kai Havertz and Christian Pulisic, possibly also Hakim Ziyech for a forward spot, he is also behind Reece James, Cesar Azpilicueta and now Ruben Loftus-Cheek at wingback too.
Hudson-Odoi pushing to go isn't an issue, as replacing him with Gordon - who appears to be of a similar calibre, is the same age and would seemingly also be in the same position in the pecking order for Tuchel - makes sense. Also in a similar position this summer are Carney Chukwuemeka and Billy Gilmour. The new 18-year-old from Aston Villa already looks more advanced than Gilmour, who hasn't been handed a shirt number for the new season.
Although there can be little doubt over the quality of Chukwuemeka, one of the brightest stars in England, Chelsea are once again choosing to effectively spend money - £20m - to replace Gilmour's squad space with Chukwuemeka.
This isn't all lineal, Chukwuemeka does need time to improve and Gimour is three years older than him and would likely have pushed for a move this summer even without Chukwuemeka's incoming, but the new strategy of heavily investing in young players will still only play dividends if they are ultimately given a chance and managed well.
Given that Hudson-Odoi arguably hasn't been handled very well, and now Chelsea would like to invest a lot of money into his replacement, there needs to be signs of a shifting attitude towards these players forging a career at Chelsea as well as signing them for business purposes.
In the centre-back department Chelsea chose, perhaps wisely in the end, to loan out Levi Colwill but they will now have to spend a world-record fee on his replacement in the squad. There is little doubting that right now Fofana is better than Colwill and may always be, but Chelsea will need to start using their own academy wiser soon, otherwise they will forever be bringing in more expensive replacements.
In this instance Colwill is two years younger than Fofana. By the time the new-Brighton defender hits that age he will - hopefully - have had two seasons of Premier League experience which would in all likeliness leave him with more league games played by that age than Fofana.
The hope in this instance is that Chelsea can make the two co-exist, but when looking at the squad make-up, the maths equates that Chelsea are spending £80m to replace a similarly aged player of similarly rated potential.
To add to the list, Conor Gallagher might feel the same way. With fresh links to Frenkie de Jong, who would improve Chelsea even if he doesn't fit the current structure as well as he might, Gallagher could become fifth choice for a position made up of just two normal starting spots. For £70m, the question really is, is it worth it?
Pile the squad high with talented players, two great players for each position is the aim, but replacing their own promising youngsters with big money moves for players of a similar calibre, Hudson-Odoi and Gordon are the closest to this situation, may not be a wise thing to keep doing.
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