da blaze casino： Chelsea could well see their pursuit of Moises Caicedo fall short, with their latest bid of £80m being swiftly rejected by Brighton and Hove Albion.
da betway： The South coast side have valued the 21-year-old at £100m and this could perhaps push Mauricio Pochettino back to the drawing board in terms of midfield alternatives.
Losing N’Golo Kante, Mateo Kovacic, Ruben Loftus-Cheek, and Mason Mount has left the Argentinian with a big void in his midfield. Could he potentially plug one gap with a current Premier League midfielder? With Amadou Onana emerging as a target.
Could Chelsea sign Amadou Onana?
According to The Evening Standard, the Stamford Bridge side are looking at a few alternatives for Caicedo, with Paris Saint-Germain midfielder Leandro Paredes one of the targets.
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Another name linked with a potential move is Onana, with Pochettino seeing the young Belgian as someone who could offer the same traits as Caicedo, while costing a fraction of the price.
The £100k-per-week starlet still has four years remaining on his Everton contract, having only joined them last summer. He is valued at €22.8m (£20m) by Football Transfers and although the Toffees would likely demand more than that, Chelsea could perhaps lure him to London for a much lower figure than the £100m which is being quoted by Brighton for their prized asset.
How did Amadou Onana perform last season?
It was another tough season for the Merseyside outfit in the Premier League, narrowly avoiding relegation for the second season in a row, yet Onana was one of their few bright sparks throughout the campaign.
He ranked in the top ten across the Everton squad for overall Sofascore rating, key passes, tackles, and interceptions per game, indicating that despite it being his maiden season in England, he settled in fairly well.
Lauded as a “tenacious tackler” by talent scout Jacek Kulig, he certainly displayed this by making 2.2 tackles per game in the top flight and only four Chelsea players made more tackles than Onana last season, with one being Kante.
The Frenchman left Chelsea after seven successful years at the Blues and not only could the former Lille midfielder be a viable alternative to Caicedo, but he could also be a perfect heir to Kante.
Both Kante and Onana count tackling as a key strength, being able to win the ball back often from the heart of the pitch. They also tend to operate in a defensive midfield role, controlling the play from deep.
The pair also registered similar statistics with regard to pass success rate (83.3% to 80%) and shots per 90 (1.39 to 1.23), showing that not only do they offer a dogged nature to their respective teams, but they also hold a solid pass success rate while taking the odd shot during matches.
Kante will be a big loss to Chelsea, often doing the unheralded jobs that make a team successful, yet in the six-cap Belgian international, Pochettino has the opportunity to develop a reliable heir to his throne over the coming years.