We wrote a couple of days ago that Carney Chukwuemeka might be forced to leave Chelsea due to a lack of game time after he failed to appear against Real Madrid in our last friendly, and once again he’s been left out today against Inter Milan in our final preseason game.
Those thoughts were quickly followed by links to Barcelona, and today a new avenue has opened up – a potential move to Crystal Palace.
The Sun have today claimed that the South London club are interested in both Chukwuemeka and teammate Trevoh Chalobah, and would potentially be interested in a £45m package deal for both.
The Eagles have done well buying from Chelsea before – Chalobah could be paired up with the impressive former Cobham graduate Marc Guehi. However it could also be the departure of Guehi to a top team for big money that frees up the cash to make this double swoop happen.
A package that works – but only at the right price
The Sun’s piece claim that Palace are “shying away” from paying £25m for Chalobah, which to us is madness. He’s a young, proven, Premier League quality centre back. He should go for £30m or more.
Chukwuemeka is a different case – he’s got so much potential but hasn’t been able to show it. We can understand giving him at a discount as part of a package deal – but only if Palace are willing to pay good money for Chalobah.
From a purely financial point of view, we’d be very disappointed to get much less than £60m for the pair of them.
Chalobah has been totally frozen out and will surely take a move rather than suffer further shabby treatment. Chukwuemeka’s attitude is less clear – but it seems unlikely he isn’t at least slightly interested in a move to somewhere he can play more.