AC Milan did make an offer to sign Carney Chukwuemeka but they never got close to Chelsea’s bid in the end, a report has claimed.
The Athletic writes that Aston Villa wanted to extend his contract and even offered to make him the highest-paid teenager in the Premier League, and if they had to sell Chukwuemeka it would only be for an offer they felt right.
Barcelona weighed up a bid while Milan were willing to pay €3.5m to sign him this summer, and while there was interest from England there was nothing suggesting any club would pay the £20m (€24m) they wanted.
Chelsea owner Todd Boehly and Villa chief executive Christian Purslow had talks over a dinner and Chukwuemeka was mentioned, and then the ‘move was wrapped up in less than a week’.
Chelsea now have the 18-year-old and have already made the decision to integrate him into the first-team squad immediately. Villa had to sell for the offer that came in knowing would have been entitled to just £400,000 (€470k) of training compensation had he left on a free at the end of next season.
The report mentions that Chelsea moved quickly and with urgency because they feared Milan or Barcelona would beat them to the England U19 international.
If this report is true, that’s just showing the difference in financial power between two clubs. He is maybe talented, but unproven at highest level, and on the last year of his contract. 3.5m maybe a bit low but a good base to start negotiations, I expect him to sign for about 5-10m but Chelsea is desperate/have too much money? So what can we say.
AR totally agree, theres no point competing against the Prem big boys. Look at the CDK transfer, we only got him because he wanted to join us. Leeds were offering more wages and a higher transfer amount. Leeds!
the only reason why we got CDK because we were UCL team .
24m euro that chelsea offer for 18 years player that only have 1 years contract left are too much , we will doom if follow chelsea path. Better wait for him next season and loan him after chelsea already bored waiting his growth like we did to many chelsea player ( loan with buy option)
Ahhh….Investcorp where are you my friend??? LOL
They are hiding in shame unable to raise money for the takeover.