Romano reports exclusively on when Chelsea expect first major summer deal complete | OneFootball

While Chelsea continue to push to make signings, there are also important sales to be made, and one of them looks like it will be completed soon.

Ian Maatsen’s move to Aston Villa looks almost done – David Ornstein reported yesterday that a £37.5m figure had been agreed, while Fabrizio Romano followed that up earlier this afternoon by saying that progress on personal terms was going well.

Romano has today used his exclusive column for the Daily Briefing to explain a little more about the transfer in detail. Why is it more than the £35m clause that was part of Maatsen’s loan to Dortmund? Because that clause has expired.

This extra juice on top serves another purpose, as Romano explains: “paying slightly more also means Villa can pay it over several years, so the terms are better for them.”

“It’s also important to say that Borussia Dortmund really tried to advance on signing Maatsen permanently, but they never offered £35m. So, the deal is agreed between Chelsea Villa for £37.5m, Maatsen is now negotiating personal terms with Villa, and the hope for all parties is to get a deal done this week. A ‘here we go’ could come soon.”

His conclusion is that the teams will “get a deal done this week.”

Ian Maatsen playing for the Netherlands.

The details of a complex deal

All of that makes perfect sense – who would have thought that being a football fan would educate you so much about corporate finance and bookkeeping?

There’s also an interesting snippet in there about the player who could move the other way, previously mentioned by Romano in his Tweet on the deal yesterday.

It had been assumed this was going to be Jhon Duran, given we’ve been endlessly linked with him, but Romano says it “could be an academy player, so don’t expect big names.”

Duran has been excluded because Chelsea want to assess their other options further before committing to the Villa backup striker.