Benfica miss out on top option after trying to wear Chelsea down | OneFootball

Chelsea’s battle to sell Joao Felix continues.

After signing him for around €45m last summer, a disappointing season has made him hard to shift. His loan at AC Milan saw zero interest from the Italian side in bringing him in permanently, and rumoured interest from Turkey has also failed to materialise.

The one team interested in signing him is his old club Benfica. And they’re happy to play the waiting game. The deal is walking into them, with Chelsea getting more desperate to sell and no other suitors arriving. So far there’s been tons of talk about a deal, but nothing concrete has really emerged.

Benfica have shown one weakness in their strong position however – a touch of sentimentality. Portuguese paper Record have claimed that president Rui Costa is reserving his own number ten shirt, hoping for a Felix return.

Chelsea – Benfica battle could continue far into future

Joao Felix regrets a missed chance. (Photo by George Wood/Getty Images)

The problem here is that, no matter how much Chelsea want to sell and Benfica want to buy, if the money isn’t right, nothing can happen.

All that confident talk from the Portuguese press last week that a split had been agreed where the Portuguese club would pay €25m for 50% of Felix already looks to be nonsense. They likely could sign him for around €30m, allowing the Blues to make a tolerable loss on what they paid Atletico last year, but even that looks a stretch for them.

As predicted above, this game of cat and mouse will likely continue into September if there is no sudden breakthrough financially. The fact that super agent Jorge Mendes represents Felix does give us some hope – he doesn’t want his client sitting on the bench. If uncle Jorge can’t get a deal done, nobody can.

UPDATE:

Al Nassr have swooped in with a bid and beaten Benfica’s offer! That weakness did cost them in the end after all.