Mauricio Pochettino has arrived for his first day at Chelsea on Monday. After officially starting as manager on July 1, the new week has seen him pictured at Cobham for the first time since becoming boss.
Over four weeks of talks were held with Pochettino back in May before an agreement was reached ahead of him replacing Frank Lampard at the end of the 2022/23 season. Now, with attention turning towards pre-season, Pochettino is at the club's Surrey training base to kick things off.
He will be without a host of first-team stars for now. Many are on holiday, some are still in action at the Under-21 European Championships and others are in the process of being sold. On that note, six of the squad from last year have already departed.
Pochettino will be working with a reduced group as players gradually return for preparation ahead of the new campaign but certain figures will not be appearing again. Edouard Mendy, Mateo Kovacic, Ruben Loftus-Cheek, Kalidou Koulibaly and Kai Havertz have all exited the club on permanent transfers.
N'Golo Kante left after his contract expired and an agreement with Saudi Arabian side Al-Ittihad was reached instead of a renewal at Stamford Bridge. Mason Mount is at Manchester United for a medical ahead of a big-money move to Old Trafford.
It leaves Pochettino with a fresh faced and largely inexperienced group, especially as club captain Cesar Azpilicueta is also readying himself for departure. Even with returning loanees, there is a lack of players in the 24-29 age bracket.
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One who fits into that category is Christian Pulisic. The American winger is widely expected to leave the club in the coming weeks with interest from Lyon and AC Milan starting to ramp up ahead of Chelsea's trip to USA for pre-season in less than a fortnight.
Pulisc had a frustrating season plagued by injury and inconsistent gametime across four coaches and has entered the final 12 months of his contract in west London. He is now waiting to find a new club with no clear route into the Chelsea squad and Pochettino being blessed with forward options already.
After securing the CONCACAF Nations League with a 2-0 win over Canada last month, Pulisic scored twice as captain in the 3-0 semi-final affair with Mexico, he now has some time off before returning and putting his attention towards domestic football once more.
Now, with Pochettino in-place at Cobham, and with his arrival documented by the club's social media team with a video captioned: "This is where is starts," Pulisic is unsurprisingly nowhere to be seen.
He is enjoying time away on holiday whilst the Argentine manager gets his feet under the table. Given the speed of fresh talks over an exit from SW6, Pulisic may not even return to Chelsea now and may well have had his last day at the training ground, too.
Unlike Pochettino this is the end of his time at Chelsea, not the start.
