How Chelsea summer spending could smash the £300m barrier
FT Desk
- Updated: 5 Aug 2022 13:21 BST
- 3 min read
Chelsea have already dropped more than £160m on the likes of Marc Cucurella, Raheem Sterling and Kalidou Koulibaly this summer, and they could almost double that outlay with further intended targets.
The Blues finished third in the Premier League last season, 19 points off Manchester City's title-winning pace, before losing first-choice centre-backs Antonio Rudiger and Andreas Christensen on free transfers to Real Madrid and Barcelona respectively.
A Todd Boehly-led consortium has since replaced Roman Abramovich in ownership of the West London club, and the American has been good to his word of investing in the squad, with Cucurella the latest to arrive, snatched from under City's noses.
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Sterling has already opened his account for the club, scoring in the final pre-season game against Udinese, while Koulibaly has impressed at the back, but coach Thomas Tuchel has insisted all along that more surgery is needed, and it seems it might come.
The Telegraph's Jason Burt reports that the Blues still want to sign Wesley Fofana from Leicester City, as well as Barcelona pair Frenkie de Jong and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang.
'Barcelona might be desperate'
"There is a feeling that Barcelona might be becoming desperate and while coach Xavi Hernandez would rather keep Aubameyang the club could be willing to listen to offers," he writes.
"The 33-year-old striker joined Barcelona on a free transfer in February after Arsenal, where he was stripped of the captaincy, agreed to terminate his contract but he has a good relationship with Chelsea head coach Thomas Tuchel having worked with him at Borussia Dortmund."
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De Jong is understood to be owed around €20m in deferred wages from Barcelona, and although United might secure his financial future, Chelsea are seen as the better destination from a footballing point of view, with the Blues, unlike United, in this season's Champions League.
Aubameyang and De Jong are rated at €24m and €61m by Football Transfers' sophisticated algorithm, and Barca would be happy to part ways with both as they attempt to balance their books.
Chelsea and Leicester have so far been around €20m apart in their valuation for Fofana, meanwhile, but the player reportedly wants the move and recently removed Leicester from his Twitter profile, and well as unfollowing Barcelona.
