Back in the summer of 2022, Chelsea battled with Barcelona to sign Leeds winger Raphinha, and eventually lost.
The Brazilian is now a mainstay at the Nou Camp, scoring a brace against PSG in midweek and declaring he wanted to stay there and see out his contract.
This is usually a positive thing – but considering Barcelona want to sell him to help their financial issues, it’s not really what they wanted to hear. Caughtoffside pointed out that Chelsea have been linked with a second attempt to sign him, but that’s looking less likely now he’s made his position so clear.
The Brazi international has 80 career goals and 60 assists in 326 games according to TransferMarkt – that’s a really solid return given he was at some lesser clubs. He’s also Premier League experienced, which counts for a lot.
Sterling stuck on major wages
The interest we had in Raphinha in 2022 came after we had signed Raheem Sterling, but in the January window after that we signed both Noni Madueke and Mykhailo Mudryk. It felt to us like that really ended our interest in buying Raphinha, at that stage already in Barcelona.
At some point we will need to bring in some attacking reinforcements, but it will just depend on how much patience the club have in Mudryk, Madueke and Sterling, Unless they can find a buyer for them, it’s hard to see how there would be cash available for a transfer in, and it’s hard to see why anyone would be interested in buying them while their form is so poor.
Raphinha may well get his wish to stay in Barcelona after all.
Rhaphnha does not have quality to play for Chelsea so Chelsea should go for other alternative