Chelsea have fallen short with attempts to sign the Milan goalkeeper Mike Maignan and the Borussia Dortmund winger Jamie Gittens in time for the Club World Cup.
The Stamford Bridge club made moves for Gittens and Maignan before the first transfer window of the summer ended at 7pm on Tuesday night but were unwilling to pay over the odds merely to have them available for the group stages of Fifa’s newly expanded tournament, which begins this weekend.
Chelsea had a £42m bid for Gittens turned down, with Dortmund believed to be holding out for upwards of £50m, and cooled their interest in Maignan after failing to agree a fee with Milan. Milan’s £21m valuation of Maignan was deemed too high for a player with one year left on his contract. Chelsea were not actively pursuing a new goalkeeper before being offered the chance to sign the 29-year-old. They proposed a fee of £12.7m for the France No 1 and have not ruled out reopening negotiations with Milan later this summer, reasoning that the Serie A club risk losing Maignan on a free next year.
There is a bigger prospect of Chelsea revisiting a deal for Gittens when the window reopens on 16 June. They are keen to bring in a right-footed left winger after Jadon Sancho’s return to Manchester United and have already agreed terms on a seven-year deal with Gittens. The 20-year-old has been named in the Dortmund squad for the Club World Cup but he wants to join Chelsea and could yet feature for them in the knockout stages, provided the England Under-21 international does not play for the German club in the group phase.
Chelsea, who fly to the US on Friday and begin their campaign by facing the Major League Soccer side Los Angeles FC in Atlanta on Monday, are relaxed about the situation. They believe their squad is already good enough to reach the last 16 and beyond.
The long-term priority is to ensure they have the right signings in place at the start of next season. The promise of huge prize money for the winners of the Club World Cup was admittedly an incentive for entrants to make signings before the registration cut-off.
Enzo Maresca will still be able to field Liam Delap in the US after the striker’s £30m move from Ipswich. Chelsea travel to Philadelphia to play Flamengo and ES Tunis after meeting LAFC.
The move for Maignan was an opportunistic one. Maresca likes the former Lille goalkeeper, who has told Milan that he wants to leave, but the head coach has not pushed Chelsea into doing anything. The club saw a chance to sign a player of Maignan’s class and experience for a reduced fee as worth exploring but did not want to be pressured into overpaying.
Chelsea remain happy with their quartet of goalkeepers: Robert Sánchez, Filip Jörgensen, Djordje Petrovic and Mike Penders. Sánchez excelled at the end of last season, recovering from a dip in form to help Maresca’s side qualify for the Champions League. There is huge excitement about Penders following the highly rated 19-year-old’s arrival from Genk. Marcus Bettinelli, Chelsea’s previous No 3, has joined Manchester City and Kepa Arrizabalaga is poised to join Arsenal for £5m.
