Dear Evan Ferguson, common sense here. Don’t leave Brighton for Chelsea…

Dear Evan Ferguson,

Common sense here. For the love of God, don’t go to Chelsea.

Big club, lots of trophies and plenty of potential; their interest must be flattering. Chances are, they won’t be rubbish forever. But they are rubbish now, and look like they will be for a while yet.

Mauricio Pochettino has a reputation for developing young players, but does he still have the knack? His stock is sinking as your gaffer’s rises. What’s the rush? Whisper it, but Roberto De Zerbi might be at Chelsea come the summer. It would make more sense to go then.

More sense, but it wouldn’t be sensible. You’ve played 53 senior games of football. That’s all. Alan Shearer says you’re a “special talent”, and he would know. But similar things were said of Mykhaylo Mudryk, Moises Caicedo and Enzo Fernandez, and they’re all having a horrible time.

We’re not saying never move to Chelsea. Any or all of those three young stars could come good, but why struggle with them until then? Bide your time. You’re 19 years old. The offers aren’t going to dry up. Manchester United wanted you in the summer. And, by the way, wasn’t that a lucky escape?

Like Rasmus Hojlund at Old Trafford, you would be going to Chelsea to be the main man. The pressure will be extreme and you need some experience around you.

Reticent though we are to compare you to Wayne Rooney (no pressure), he had Ruud van Nistelrooy, Ryan Giggs and Ole Gunnar Solskjaer to lean on when he moved to a big club as a teenager. It’s not a bad thing to have competition – it will elevate your game.

On paper Chelsea may seem like an attractive environment in which to play football. You can develop along with the other young talent and take the world by storm together for the next decade. That’s how Laurence Stewart and Paul Winstanley will sell it to you.

Evan, it’s a fantasy. You’ve seen what they’ve done so far. ‘The project’ will fail if they don’t dramatically change their strategy. And we’re not trying to be harsh here, but signing you for £100m is not the change they need.

You’ve scored 16 goals in your senior career. That’s roughly the same as Nicolas Jackson, and while I’m convinced along with pretty much everyone else that you will achieve significantly more than him, his x-rated rant shows just how much the criticism has got to him. And we don’t mind telling you, if you don’t score goals, that criticism will come.

It may look as though you could walk into the Chelsea team and score a hatful. They’re second only to Liverpool (41) for Big Chances missed (40) and there’s more than enough xG to keep you ticking over. But it’s far from a happy hunting ground for strikers, now and ever since Diego Costa left the club six years ago.

Radamel Falcao, Michy Batshuayi, Alvaro Morata, Olivier Giroud, Gonzalo Higuain, Timo Werner and Romelu Lukaku have all come and gone, chewed up and spat out by a football club where strikers crumble. Morata, Werner and Lukaku arrived at their peak and have been picking up the pieces of their shattered confidence ever since.

The Stamford Bridge striker curse will end at some point. And Evan, you could be the man to end it. And someone, at some point, will get a tune out of this group of players or the next group Todd Boehly and Clearlake spunk a cool £1bn on. That could happen when you join, even because you join.

But you need to be sure, or at least more sure, that you’re joining a club on the up. Don’t be the man they pin their hopes on to change everything for the better. Does that man even exist? Stay at Brighton and wait for a sensible offer from a stable club.

That may well come from Chelsea, but that won’t be for a while yet.

Yours sincerely,

Football365