Inside Chelsea’s transfer window: Sancho and ‘Net-Felix’ in, no Osimhen – and the ‘bomb squad’
https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/5737271/2024/09/02/Chelsea-transfer-window-sancho-sterling-osimhen/
It was quite fitting that Chelsea got to have the last word in the 2024 summer transfer window.
At 7.30pm on Saturday, nearly 21 hours after the deadline to sign players in England had passed, Chelsea officially announced their final addition of the summer — Jadon Sancho had joined them from Manchester United on loan for the rest of the season in a deal including an obligation to buy.
It was the final significant transaction across the Premier League too (clubs can still give contracts to free agents, and sell or loan to a few leagues overseas with slightly different transfer deadlines — such as the Saudi Pro League) and Sancho was presented to supporters just before the match against Crystal Palace on Sunday afternoon. He then took a seat next to co-owner Behdad Eghbali in the stands. The 1-1 scoreline at Stamford Bridge will spark early concern from fans as to whether all the money (£219million/$287.9m, according to respected data website Transfermarkt) Chelsea have paid out in the past three months has been spent 1) well or 2) where it was most needed.
The move for Sancho had been completed in the early hours of Saturday, thanks to the much-welcomed two-hour extension provided by the submission of a deal sheet to the Premier League (the deadline had been 11pm UK time on Friday), yet it took a lot longer for the club to confirm the news.
Some supporters will have gone to bed wondering whether something had gone wrong.
One of the reasons for the delay was simply because it took longer for the Premier League to sign it off due to the sheer number of documents they had received for late transfers (there were nine deals across the division). Chelsea also needed time to get Sancho to their training ground in Cobham, south of London, to do all the in-house media for the customary grand proclamation that comes with any major signing these days.
Londoner Sancho, a boyhood Chelsea fan, conveyed his excitement. “It was the last day of the transfer window, so it is expected to be a bit crazy, but I am really happy it is all finally done,” he said.
Crazy might be a good word to describe all the comings and goings at Stamford Bridge since the window opened in June, but the club are certainly happy about the England winger’s arrival. There is no loan fee involved and the price they will be asked to pay for Sancho next summer will range from £20million to £25m depending on what he and Chelsea achieve between now and then. That is some discount, given he cost United an initial £72.6m from Germany’s Borussia Dortmund in July 2021 . One of the reasons Chelsea left it so late was that United’s asking price had been £40m but with his situation unresolved going into deadline day, United were prepared to listen to lower offers.
Chelsea are paying a proportion of his £250,000 a week wages, but Sancho is also on board with agreeing to the kind of incentivised contract the vast majority of players have signed up to since the Todd Boehly-Clearlake consortium took over in May 2022.
Clearly, the presence of co-director of recruitment and talent Joe Shields, who brought him to Manchester City from Watford in 2015 when he was their UK southern academy scouting manager, played a part in convincing the now 24-year-old to leave Old Trafford for Enzo Maresca’s side.
Perhaps at some clubs, Sancho’s arrival would be the main story of the summer, given all the intrigue around him. But Chelsea have dominated the agenda for the past few months. Barely a day seems to have gone by without the club, who did more business than any other in the Premier League, being mentioned. Large sums have been spent and received and yet despite all their efforts, including a dramatic late pursuit of Napoli’s Victor Osimhen, no elite striker arrived.
GO DEEPER
Analysing the Premier League's 2024 summer transfer window
The Athletic has spoken to people with knowledge of Chelsea’s summer business, who will remain anonymous to protect relationships, to help provide a summary of what took place…
Chelsea are not the first club to learn a thing or two after coming second best to Real Madrid.
The club had always been looking at ways to improve their attacking options, so it is not as if the 2-1 friendly loss to Madrid on August 6 in Charlotte, North Carolina, brought about a sudden change of plan. But how the game went was a timely reminder their thought process was the right one and it was not just up front they were looking at strengthening — more on that later.
The club, in consultation with Maresca, had decided in June to purchase a left winger and right winger. An early sign of this intent to strengthen out wide came in their attempt to buy Michael Olise from Crystal Palace in July. That fell through because Bayern Munich offered the Frenchman over £200,000 a week, a figure the hierarchy were not prepared to match given it did not fit into their wage structure, particularly as it was a lot more than Cole Palmer is on and it could be argued that he has achieved a lot more in the Premier League than Olise after a superb 2023-24 season.
Targets continued to be looked at and discussed. However, what took place in that game against former Madrid — managed by former Chelsea manager Carlo Ancelotti — did stiffen the resolve that changes had to be made. After all, pre-season work had been going on for four or five weeks by this point and individual performances were being closely monitored.
Although Noni Madueke scored, the performances by him and Raheem Sterling compared unfavourably to the brilliance seen from Madrid superstars Rodrygo and Vinicius Junior. While Sterling featured in all six of Chelsea’s pre-season games, a sign of Maresca’s increasing lack of confidence was already there because he only started two of them. Real Madrid was the second and probably his last ever start for Chelsea.
Little did Sterling know of that, for the winger was in the mixed zone post-match, at the request of Chelsea’s media team, speaking to journalists and praising recently-appointed Maresca’s attempts to implement a new style for the squad and stating his intention to break back into the England setup. Sterling’s form and output — he had scored 19 times and made 12 assists in 81 appearances since joining Chelsea from Manchester City in July 2022 — had been coming under increasing scrutiny for some time, despite the player having been told by the club’s leadership earlier in the summer that he remained an important part of their plans.
Within a couple of days, Chelsea had accelerated a pursuit of Wolves winger Pedro Neto. Wary of a repeat of the Olise saga, especially as they believed Liverpool could be a threat for his signature (though Liverpool deny he was a target), Chelsea acted quickly. The West Midlands club were stunned by the speed of their intervention — there had been long-term interest from Arsenal, Tottenham Hotspur and Manchester City, but Chelsea’s move came as a bolt from the blue to them.
Neto was not anticipating a departure either. A sign of his focus on Wolves came during pre-season when, while still on holiday following his international exertions with Portugal at Euro 2024, he requested a link to follow a video stream of their friendly against West Ham in Jacksonville ahead of reuniting with his team-mates there in Florida.
As far as Chelsea are concerned though, their interest dated back months. Their £51.4million bid became real by 4pm on the Thursday, less than 48 hours after the Madrid defeat in Charlotte. On the Friday, two days before he was unveiled on the pitch before Chelsea’s friendly against Inter Milan on August 11, Neto was emotional while saying his farewells. Tears were shed. But this was not a sign of someone going to another club against their will, just sadness about leaving a place he had very much come to love over the previous five years.
Sterling, even then, was unaware his own future was about to change, a matter which only crystallised when he was left out of the matchday squad for the opening Premier League game against Manchester City on August 18. Maresca had informed the England international two days before that he would have to join another club if he wanted to get regular minutes this season, which triggered that statement urging for “clarity on his future” within an hour of kick-off.
The 29-year-old was the most high-profile member of the unofficial ‘Bomb squad’ at Chelsea — a group of first-team players told to train away from their senior colleagues. In Sterling’s case, he worked out from home rather than at Cobham while his fate was being decided.
Chelsea received interest in him from the Saudi Pro League, which would have seen them get a big fee and the player receive a huge salary. It was obviously the choice the club preferred. But Sterling made it clear he did not want to go to Saudi Arabia. Juventus of Italy also made an inquiry, however, it was always going to be difficult for them to afford it due to his wages being more than £300,000 a week.
He was suggested to Manchester United by the club during their engagement over Sancho and the Old Trafford side considered it as part of a separate transaction. But it did not get much further than that. Sterling’s desire to stay in London, his hometown and where his family are settled, plus his close ties with Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta from their time at Manchester City, led to him choosing a season-long loan to the Emirates on deadline day, with Chelsea paying more than 50 per cent of his salary. A permanent solution on a player who is under contract until summer 2027 will be looked into next year.
During negotiations over Neto, his agent Jorge Mendes kept updating Chelsea on the availability of another of his clients, Joao Felix, at Atletico Madrid. Chelsea did not need much convincing, Joao Felix had been at the club on loan from January to May 2023. Atletico’s asking price at that time, plus newly-appointed Chelsea head coach Mauricio Pochettino not being keen on the player, dissuaded them from making his move permanent last summer.
At £44.5million, it was regarded as another bargain, given Atletico had paid Benfica £113m for his services in 2019. Joao Felix also agreed to fit within Chelsea’s wage structure, thanks to a relatively modest base salary and significant performance-related bonuses. When Neto set up Joao Felix for Chelsea’s final goal in the 6-2 win at Wolves on August 25, an affectionate nickname of ‘Net-Felix’ started doing the rounds, a term that has since been adopted by people at the club to describe them.
Sancho completes a hat-trick of 24-year-olds signed in this window with their prime years in front of them.
Chelsea did crave a traditional No 9, something Maresca admitted himself, and supporters were left frustrated when no striker, apart from Marc Guiu, an inexperienced 18-year-old signed for £5million from Barcelona, came through the door.
It was not for a lack of trying. Still, as shown by summer 2023 signing Nicolas Jackson getting a new contract, they regard the Senegal international highly. One of the reasons Maresca was hired to replace Pochettino after last season was his experience of working under Pep Guardiola at Manchester City, who played with false nines before the club signed Erling Haaland two years ago. With Joao Felix and Christopher Nkunku also in the squad, Chelsea feel they have two forwards who are very adept at the role should Jackson be out, plus Guiu and 19-year-old Deivid Washington, who are seen as up-and-coming players able to provide some backup.
This will not appease the doubters.
After dismissing a pursuit of Osimhen at the beginning of the window, Chelsea spent the last few weeks pushing for it.
The club were realistic, knowing they could not compete financially with the huge sums being offered to Napoli and the forward by Saudi side Al Ahli. Despite the odds being stacked against them, Chelsea decided it was better to make an attempt, even if it failed, than not try at all.
Conversations were going on with Napoli anyway because of the Italian club’s desire to purchase Chelsea’s misfit striker Romelu Lukaku, who had spent the previous two seasons in Serie A on loan to Inter Milan and then Roma. But a straight swap was always regarded as an impossibility. The pair were going to have to be sorted out separately. After their sporting director Giovanni Manna came to London last week, Lukaku was sold to Napoli for €30million (£25.2m/$33.2m), with Chelsea also entitled to a large chunk of any loan or permanent transfer fee his new club get for the Belgian in the future. Chelsea say that figure is 40 per cent, while reports in Italy suggest it is 30 per cent. Napoli declined to comment.
A senior member of staff was dispatched to Naples as part of their recruitment efforts for Osimhen. Former Chelsea midfielder Mikel John Obi, who had been very vocal in the media about the need for his fellow Nigerian in Maresca’s attack, was also involved.
Chelsea explored up to seven different structures of a pay deal for the 25-year-old without any success. Osimhen wanted to come but he also wanted a lucrative offer that, similarly to Olise earlier in the summer, was outside the parameters the club operate at. With no sums arranged with the player, despite Chelsea pushing to the final hours, they did not get very far in formalising anything with Napoli, whether a straight loan or one with either an option or an obligation to buy.
Several names, some who were part of the wishlist earlier in the window, were mentioned as potential late back-up options in case Osimhen fell through, but with Neto, Joao Felix and Sancho in the building, they were not considered.
These included Aston Villa’s Jhon Duran, who they opted against several weeks before, having conducted a thorough review of the player. Lille’s Jonathan David was another Chelsea looked at. Everton’s Dominic Calvert-Lewin was a topic amid chats about Chelsea counterparts Armando Broja and David Datro Fofana, while talk of Brentford’s Ivan Toney, who signed for Al Ahli after Osimhen turned them down, was more of a smokescreen while Chelsea concentrated their efforts on the Napoli man.
Chelsea had asked Newcastle about Alexander Isak for most of the year, especially when they were having concerns over profit and sustainability rules (PSR) in June. But it would have taken a club-record transfer fee to get him and Newcastle always saw cashing in on Isak as a last resort. The much-admired Benjamin Sesko signed an extension to remain at Germany’s RB Leipzig that same month.
A fee of £34.4million and a lengthy contract (seven years, plus an option for a further 12 months) were put in place for Atletico Madrid attacker Samu Omorodion in the first week of August. But unforeseen issues arose, including a problem with the personal terms. He ended up moving to Porto for just £12.7m instead, leading to inevitable questions from the outside over why it was so much less than the fee that would have taken him to west London. Chelsea have chosen not to expand on what happened.
Their first completed bit of business was actually for a player who will not arrive until next year — Estevao Willian. The exciting 17-year-old Brazilian, who is joining from Palmeiras for an initial €34million, plus another €23m in potential add-ons, will add to their options out wide.
After being hired following his success leading Leicester City to Premier League promotion last season in his first full year as a manager, Maresca quickly had his say on recruitment. His intervention played a part in defender Tosin Adarabioyo choosing to join Chelsea over Newcastle after his contract expired at neighbours Fulham and it was no coincidence that the attacking midfielder who thrived under the Italian at Leicester last season, Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall, arrived for £30million.
After a few weeks of pre-season, Maresca did not see Djordje Petrovic, who ended 2023-24 as first-choice in goal, as someone who could play out from the back, so £20.7million was forked out for Filip Jorgensen from Villarreal and Petrovic was then subsequently loaned out to Strasbourg. Remarkably, a further £17m was then given to Genk for Mike Penders, a goalkeeper who has been compared to Chelsea’s former No 1, and fellow Belgian, Thibaut Courtois. The 19-year-old is another player who has been lined up for the 2025-26 season and will continue at Genk in the meantime. He had been scouted by head of global goalkeeping Ben Roberts for the past two years and Chelsea have beaten some high-profile European clubs to his signature.
Meanwhile, Kepa Arrizabalaga, who has been at Chelsea since 2018, is still on the books to some degree. He signed a new deal and took a pay cut before joining fellow Premier League side Bournemouth on loan for the rest of the season.
But all these incomings — and potential incomings — were just part of the story…
Of all the players to leave Chelsea, Conor Gallagher was the most contentious.
He clocked up some air miles as he flew to Madrid to complete a £35.8million switch to Atletico only to briefly return to London again after the deal for Omorodion to move the opposite way broke down. The England midfielder trained on his own at Cobham, anxiously waiting for a breakthrough.
This brought back memories of the Mason Mount saga a year before — an academy graduate who had become a regular in the first team being sold with only 12 months left on his deal. Chelsea had three new-contract offers turned down (including one last year) which would have put the England international on similar terms to the club’s highest-paid midfielders. However, it was just for an initial two years, hardly sending a signal of being part of Chelsea’s long-term plans when so many of his team-mates have been given deals for seven years and beyond.
But Gallagher had also rejected Aston Villa’s advances earlier in the window. This caused alarm. After being stung by defenders Antonio Rudiger and Andreas Christensen leaving as free agents in summer 2022 because the previous regime had failed to agree new contracts with them, Chelsea made it clear to Gallagher that they could not afford for him to follow suit.
Chelsea’s deal with Atletico for Joao Felix provided the green light. Even then, there was a brief rumour something had gone wrong because of speculation Gallagher’s plane back to Madrid had been cancelled. It turned out that it had simply been pushed back a few hours to give him more time to pack. Agent Ali Barat helped mediate.
The club have always maintained they would comply with PSR rules for 2023-24 regardless. Still, selling academy trio Ian Maatsen (£37.5m), Omari Hutchinson (up to £22.5m, albeit Arsenal are entitled to a sell-on percentage) and Lewis Hall (£28m) before June 30 certainly would not have done any harm in achieving this as it counted as pure profit. For all the accusations that Chelsea were only interested in selling academy players — Michael Golding was another sold, for up to £5million to Leicester — they ignored interest in defender Levi Colwill from Bayern Munich, telling the Germans he was not for sale at any price. Reece James was also named captain for a second consecutive season.
The treatment of Gallagher, and others who were frozen out, sparked much public criticism. Chelsea argue it was better to be honest with players who were not part of their, or Maresca’s, plans. Letting people believe they were in the squad only to use it as a ploy to put them in the shop window was seen as counterproductive.
Chelsea accepted an initial £750,000 bid from Saudi club Al Ettifaq for under-21s midfielder Harvey Vale last week, and urged the academy graduate to go there because it was the only firm bid they had received. With less than a year left on his contract, both parties agreed such a permanent move was his best chance to develop. But Vale refused to go and is hoping to find a different club in a league where the windows are still open over the coming days. Belgian side Union Saint-Gilloise are interested and are his preferred option.
Striker Armando Broja would have gone to promoted Ipswich Town on loan in a deal including an obligation to buy next year for £30million. However, a foot injury suffered while training with the ‘bomb squad’ (which rules him out until October) raised concerns during his medical and Ipswich ended up pulling out. With no move forthcoming and fearing the prospect of not playing until January, Broja approached the club with a few hours of the window remaining and urged them to find a solution, telling them he wanted to leave.
Chelsea acquiesced and agreed a loan with Everton, a club that had shown an interest in signing him since last year. But due to the late nature of the deal, Everton were able to get him on favourable terms with no loan fee involved and just an option (rather than obligation) worth £30m. They also do not have to contribute to his Chelsea wages until he is fit.
The high-profile nature of Chelsea’s outcasts led to many clubs deliberately waiting until the end of the window to make a pitch.
Chelsea wanted at least £25million for defender Trevoh Chalobah, who had been ostracised since being told he would not go on their pre-season tour to the USA. Finally, he moved to Crystal Palace on a season-long loan on deadline day after making it clear he wanted to join a London club.
One sporting director at a foreign club was watching Chelsea’s attempts to move on some of their fringe players very carefully on Friday. He was keen to sign a player on loan, but needed to ensure that deal did not take up any more of his club’s foreign loan spots (four of six used up so far). Therefore, he was willing domestic moves to go through — such as those involving Broja, Chalobah and Sterling — to allow his proposed transfer to still be possible while his nation’s window stayed open.
Chelsea do expect more players to leave this week following the sale of Angelo Gabriel to Al Nassr on Monday for €23m (£19.4m).
French newspaper L’Equipe reported that Chelsea’s Ligue 1 sister club Strasbourg, who are owned by their parent company BlueCo, were going to pay €21million for him. That would have been an extraordinary fee for someone who has made just three substitute appearances for Chelsea since joining from Santos in Brazil for a similar amount the year before. Chelsea deny this was ever a possibility and say the only discussion was over a loan. They ignored two inquiries from top-10 Premier League teams over a sale on deadline day, insisting Washington is not a player they want to cash in on.
His fellow youngsters Carney Chukwuemeka and Cesare Casadei will be part of the first-team squad. A loan was considered for the former, so he could get the chance to play more than 30 matches this season, but nothing came out of all the interest. As The Athletic reported, Casadei was back in the fold once Lesley Ugochukwu was loaned to Southampton, after the Italian recovered from a minor injury sustained on the U.S. tour.
There is genuine regret that nothing could be arranged for one of Chelsea’s highest-paid players, Ben Chilwell.
While Sterling’s lack of consistent form played a part in his demotion, Chilwell’s role as an orthodox left-back/left wing-back just does not fit into Maresca’s system. Renato Veiga, a 21-year-old bought from Swiss side Basel this summer, is ahead of him in the pecking order and is the main backup to first-choice Marc Cucurella.
Unsurprisingly, Chelsea ended up being the biggest spenders again, but they got a lot of players off the books too. In this piece by The Athletic summarising Premier League spending in the transfer window, it shows their net spend at £72m. Chelsea intend to make at least a couple more sales abroad and, if successful, are optimistic it will take their net spend to around zero. The departure of Gabriel, who was sold for €8m more than they paid Santos last year, has already taken them a step closer to doing that. The purchase of predominantly under-25 players over the last four windows has turned the squad from one of the oldest in the Premier League to one of the youngest in Europe.
Chelsea will take stock over the next few months and consider whether they should be active again in the January window. Maresca admitted after the disappointing result against Palace on Sunday that a move for a striker will be reconsidered. As the Italian closes in on the 100-day mark in charge, his impact on the selected squad and connection with the management structure above him has been positive. Maresca may have won just two of his opening five competitive fixtures, but those at the top of the club are even more convinced they made the right appointment based on everything they have seen so far.
But perhaps a bit of enforced calm, now that their ability to sign players is over for at least four months, is what everyone at the club needs most of all.
