Romano’s thoughts on Chelsea links with player demanding £500,000 a week | OneFootball

TBR Football’s Graeme Bailey has today put out an article casting doubt over the progress of Vinicius Junior’s contract talks with Real Madrid.

The 24 year old is a world class winger who was close to winning the Ballon d’Or last year, and he’s looking for a raise on the deal he signed in 2023.

The arrival of Kylian Mbappe a year later has massively changed the dynamics in that dressing room, and now Vinicius apparently wants wages close to the insane £500,000 a week the Frenchman is paid.

Tensions are rising, as everyone knew they would. There’s not room for that many superstars in one team, even in Madrid. Real would apparently only consider bids of around £200m, ruling out pretty much everyone apart from Saudi Arabian teams.

Chelsea are also said to be “huge admirers” and “very interested in landing him,” if the situation in Spain deteriorates further.

All talk from Vinicius’s side

To us, this is a case as clear as day of an agent trying to get his client a better deal at his current club by talking up interest from elsewhere.

Vinicius is a superstar player, but doesn’t fit our model at all. He would come with a vast transfer fee and wage demands attached, enough to blow apart the whole project we’ve been working on for 3 years now under the new ownership.

Is he good enough to justify that? Probably not. He’s an explosive character too, and in a dressing room which already lacks leaders, that could be a totally toxic combination.

If tensions continue to grow in Madrid, Vini may yet leave. Will that be to Chelsea? No chance. This isn’t the first time we’ve heard it rumoured – back in November Fabrizio Romano called it “absolutely not realistic” that we’d move for him, and we can’t say anything has changed since then.