(Football news) Premier League side Chelsea have added Barcelona striker Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang to their list of potential targets for the striker and have already begun talks with the player, according to Fabrizio Romano. Chelsea are still in the initial stages of the deal and haven’t talked to Barça yet, but it’s quite a surprise to see the Blues potentially making a move for Aubameyang since they were other targets such as Sesko and Dominic Calvert Lewin.
It will be interesting to see if the two clubs will eventually discuss some sort of a swap deal as Barca want to sign César Azpilicueta and Marcos Alonso. Chelsea also reportedly want to hijack the Frenkie De Jong deal but he doesn’t want to leave the club. Aubameyang is happy at Barça but his role is going to be considerably diminished with the arrival of Robert Lewandowski and he could be tempted to re-join his former coach Thomas Tuchel if he’s promised first team football in London. This has really come as a shock since Chelsea were reportedly looking for young striker to replace Romelu Lukaku who left Chelsea for Inter on loan this summer
Aubameyang, who’s very familiar to the Premier League from his time at Arsenal, is the latest striker to be linked with Chelsea in what has become a manic window for them. ‘Auba’ scored 92 goals in only 163 Arsenal appearances, so he’s a striker who knows where the back of the net is and also last season he netted 13 goals in 23 games for Barcelona, helping them in their late resurgence. It’s obvious that the Chelsea fans are desperate for the club to sign a new No.9 in this window because of a huge void that has emerged since the departure of Romelu Lukaku but Aubameyang seems to fit the bill.
It’s unclear at this stage on how likely this deal actually is to happen, but it’s interesting that Chelsea manager Thomas Tuchel previously coached Aubameyang when the pair were successful at Borussia Dortmund. Tuchel even explained last year that he remains “very close” with the Barca star who is reportedly earning £250,000-a-week. Aubameyang spent his best goal scoring years with Dortmund under Tuchel’s management as he almost helped the Black and yellow win the Bundesliga. Tuchel is concerned with his side’s preparation going into the season as the players he originally targeted rejected Chelsea for Barcelona. The Chelsea manager needs a quick fix to his problems at the club, hence he is targeting players who he has previously worked with.
“He( Aubameyang) was a very important player for me and I still have a very close relationship with him,” Tuchel said in December, 2021.
