David Ornstein is reporting the news that we have been waiting for all day – and all month, in fact.
According to his Tweet, Chelsea have reached an “agreement in principle” for Benfica midfielder Enzo Fernandez. The player had to push hard on his end, and Benfica (to their credit) clung on until the end.
His release clause was €120m, but Chelsea didn’t want to pay the lump sum up front. That has led to days of negotiations – and in fact will mean that Chelsea end up paying significantly more than that. The final deal will be something like €125m, a UK transfer record.
The transfer deadline has now passed – but with enough elements already in place, an extension to complete the details won’t be an issue. As we reported earlier, the medical team were already in Lisbon to get things done. Let’s hope they manage it.
After all that we don’t want to count our chickens too early, but it looks like it’s done.