Chelsea have had a lot of players in form recently, none more so than Mateo Kovacic.
With N’Golo Kante out injured this season, it’s fallen on Kovacic to balance both attacking and defensive duties alongside Jorginho, and the pair have performed superbly, especially in the last month or so.
Chelsea have a lot of central midfielders, and with the transfer ban in place it didn’t look at all certain that we would sign the Croatian last summer, despite a successful season on loan.
As it turned out, we did complete the deal, for £40m, a fee which increasingly looks like pennies for a top class midfielder.
Kovacic is a Champions League level player, proven with Real Madrid, and still only 25. To pick him up for £4om was pretty scandalous, especially when you consider we were effectively over a barrel because of the transfer ban.
Real Madrid needed to sell to balance the books after their own transfer surge, and we capitalised in their moment of weakness.
