Last season, Chelsea finished in the top four of the Premier League and won the Conference League.
Then, they went and won the Club World Cup, beating Champions League winners PSG 3-0 in the final.
Despite this, they have still been busy in the transfer window, albeit not as busy as previous years.
Joao Pedro and Liam Delap – amongst others – joined ahead of and during the Club World Cup.
Whilst Estevao joined the club from Palmeiras after a pre-arranged deal, and registered his first assist against West Ham United.
Well, just when you thought things had gone a bit quiet on the Chelsea front, they are back in the news again.
As per David Ornstein, Enzo Maresca’s side are exploring a move for Barcelona midfielder Fermin Lopez.
He reports that they are in touch with the player’s camp, given Barcelona’s depth in his position.
Lopez started Barcelona’s season opener away to Mallorca, but was hooked at half-time.
In the next game away to Levante, he was an unused substitute.
Since Hansi Flick took charge last summer, he has regularly featured for the Catalans, but mostly off the bench.
After an injury at the start of last season, he played in 28 league games, with 12 of those being starts.
The 22-year old scored six goals, provided five assists, and created eight big chances in 1255 La Liga minutes. Pretty good.
Previously, he had featured in 31 La Liga games in 23/24 under Xavi, scoring eight times in 1451 minutes.
So, his output record is pretty good when he is on the pitch.
He is a box crashing midfielder with a lot of physical attributes, whilst being able to hold his own technically.
Last summer, he was part of Spain’s successful Euros squad, but played just 28 minutes all tournament.
After that, he impressed with some sublime performances at the Olympics, scoring five goals, including twice in the final, as he helped Spain to the gold medal.
Since the Euros, however, he has not played for Spain, and has been called up just once.
With the World Cup next year – he may think that more regular game time is needed.
That said, a move to Chelsea is probs not the best move for him if he wants to do that.
It would be a good move for the Blues, with Lopez able to provide tough competition for Cole Palmer.
You’d imagine if that was the alternative, he’d probably just try and get Dani Olmo’s starting position off of him at Barcelona.
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