Steven Gerrard was impressed with Chelsea's recruitment in the summer and felt they did good business in Todd Boehly's first transfer window since taking over.
The Blues were one of the busiest Premier League clubs, with only Nottingham Forets signings more players. Chelsea spent over £250million in new arrivals, with Wesley Fofana, Marc Cucurella, Raheem Sterling and Kalidou Koulibaly coming in as their biggest recruits.
Meanwhile, Pierre Emerick-Aubameyang was arguably their most high-profile recruit when he arrived from Barcelona on deadline day. Denis Zakaria and Carney Chukwuemeka completed their transfer business as the Blues revamped their squad following the sale to Boehly in June.
The sheer volume of transfer activity highlighted Boehly's ambition. However, it wasn't to everybody's liking. Gary Neville labelled Boehly's recruitment as 'scattergun' and 'unsustainable' in a Twitter argument with Blues legend John Terry back in August.
Earlier this season, Neville tweeted: "Your man Todd Woodward needs to stop wandering round like a kid in a sweet shop. It’s just scattergun and unsustainable. I doubt this approach will go well."
However, his former England teammate Gerrard disagrees with Neville's statement and believes it was a good transfer window for Chelsea, although they have seemed to hit form recently due a managerial change. Graham Potter replaced Thomas Tuchel at the helm last month, and they have since won their last four matches.
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"They’ve recruited extremely well," said Gerrard, via Birmingham Live. "They’ve changed manager of late and seem to be in a honeymoon period.
"Everything points to them being favourites in the game, but this is at Villa Park. We’re a bit frustrated that we haven’t taken wins from our previous two and we want to use that frustration in the right way. We want to take the game to Chelsea and be as aggressive as we can."
Potter has guided Chelsea to back-to-back Champions League wins over AC Milan and league successes against Crystal Palace and Wolves, and it is safe to say he has got the Blues moving in the right direction.
The 47-year-old did comment on his counterpart in Gerrard, however, with the Aston Villa boss struggling at the moment. Villa face Chelsea on Sunday afternoon, with the West Midlands side searching for their third win of the season.
Speaking in his press conference, Potter said: "The margins are very small as we’ve said in the Premier League. I’m sure Steven will want to improve the results and will be looking to this game to try to do that. Had they beaten Nottingham Forest they would have gone above Liverpool, so that shows you how quickly things can change.
"We have to make sure we’re ready for the challenge. In the Premier League, there is always someone under pressure. At the moment it’s Steven but he has the quality and experience and will come through I’m sure. So he has to make sure we’re good ourselves and with the greatest respect, not worry to much about Aston Villa and concentrate on ourselves."
