Exclusive: Chelsea’s top scout is “pushing hard” for £45m England star who has just joined shortlist | OneFootball

While the focus is squarely on Chelsea’s hunt for a new manager right now, the transfer heads are of course working hard, and a new exclusive from Simon Phillips today reveals that Chelsea have a new target in their sights.

We already know the Blues like the look of Michael Olise from Crystal Palace, now it turns out that they fancy his teammate Eberechi Eze too.

“Chelsea have been watching him and Michael Olise all season with scouts at many of their games. They have been impressed with both. Chelsea remain interested in Olise too, but also now in Eze. You’d expect it to be one or the other IF Chelsea did make a move for either player,” Phillips reports.

“Joe Shields has been pushing hard for Chelsea to move for Olise, but he’s also aware of and rates Eze highly, as do other scouts at Chelsea.”

Looking from the outside, Shields has a better record so far in signing players than the sporting directors, so he could well get his way again.

Eberechi Eze playing for Crystal Palace.

A hard situation to resolve without sales

Much as with Olise, we think Eze is a brilliant player, we just don’t see how he fits into the squad or the budget right now. There’s a glut of wingers, and that’s before you even consider the fact that Kendry Paez and (likely) Estevao Willian are on the way to join in the next 12 months too.

It would be a lot more believable if Noni Madueke, Raheem Sterling or Mykhailo Mudryk were in a position to be sold. But all cost so much (either in transfer fee or wages) that it’s impossible to shift them this summer without making a loss. So they’re sticking around, and that makes it very hard to add another player in their position this summer, given the team’s needs in defence and midfield.