Barcelona swoop for Chelsea flop and fellow teenage wonderkid

Robin Bairner

• Updated: 4 Oct 2023 16:30 BST
• 2 min read

Barcelona are ready to swoop for Corinthians midfielder Gabriel Moscardo, and could also end Andrey Santos' nightmare at Chelsea.

Barcelona have been given the edge in the race for the 18-year-old Moscardo thanks to Andrey Santos’ nightmare move to Chelsea.

The Blues are also interested in Moscardo, but having seen his compatriot’s struggles since moving to the Premier League, it is thought that his agent will push him instead to Barcelona.

Sport reports that despite Chelsea having their eye on the player, Barca are willing to enter the race because they believe Moscardo has seen the experience of Andrey Silva and will not move to a club in England.

Indeed, the Catalan paper has detailed Andrey Silva’s problems since moving to the Premier League.

Andrey Silva’s Chelsea problems

The 19-year-old completed a €12.5 million transfer from Vasco da Gama to Chelsea in the summer but has since been loaned out to Nottingham Forest.

Despite playing for a club in the middle ranks of the Premier League, Andrey Santos has managed to make the bench only on two occasions from a possible five since joining Steve Cooper’s side, while he has yet to play a minute of league football. Indeed, his only competitive action this season was a 1-0 loss to Burnley in the EFL Cup.

Barcelona had previously been monitoring him, having seen the teenager as a long-term replacement for Sergio Busquets, who joined Lionel Messi’s Inter Miami on a free transfer in the summer.

And the indications are that the Camp Nou side have not dropped their interest entirely yet.

According to Sport: “A nightmare began that is seriously compromising Andrey Santos’ sporting career. Barca are very attentive to what happens to him because he is a diamond in the rough who has made the wrong decision.”

Barcelona were so eager to pick up the youngster, that even after he completed his summer switch to Chelsea, which was complicated by visa problems, they asked for a loan. In the end, however, they opted to move for Oriol Romeu to fill Busquets’ void.

With the medium and long-term future of Andrey Silva still unclear, Moscardo represents another possibility for Barca in the transfer market and one they are sure to explore in the weeks leading up to the next transfer window in January.