Chelsea reportedly attempted to sign Barcelona’s Memphis Depay before getting Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang last summer.
Well-respected journalist Simon Phillips has explained that Chelsea contacted Depay’s agent and were looking at bringing him to Stamford Bridge this season.
However, the Blues ended up signing Aubameyang from Barcelona, with Marcos Alonso heading in the other direction.
Simon Phillips has detailed Chelsea’s previous interest in Depay, but suggests he’s not on their radar at this moment in time.
He told GiveMeSport: “I’ve spoken to sources recently about replacing [Armando] Broja. Depay’s name hasn’t been one that’s been given to me, but you can see why he’s been linked again because Chelsea did look at him in the summer and they did try and sign him in the last week of the summer window when a move for Aubameyang was stalling.
“They thought that they had to find someone else and Depay came up. They did reach out to his agent and said they were interested in signing him. In the end, Aubameyang went through and they didn’t need to go to Depay.”
Chelsea attempted to sign Depay
According to Sport last July, Barcelona wanted as much as €20million (£18million) to sell Depay. He stayed with the Camp Nou this season, making just three appearances so far due to injury.
The Evening Standard claimed last August that Depay was offered to Chelsea, and new speculation suggests he’s available to sign this month. Simon Phillips claims he’s not on the Blues transfer shortlist, though.
Sport recently claimed that, Depay is available to talk to clubs this month given his Barcelona contract expires at the end of the season. It is explained that the Holland international has already been offered to a number of teams, including Newcastle United, as Barca look to raise some cash with his sale in January.
He’s a talented centre-forward that has shown at club and international level he can score goals, but it didn’t work out too well for him the last time he played in England with Manchester United.
AS claim that Depay would still be open to the idea of joining Chelsea and completing a move to Stamford Bridge. However, there’s not a lot of concrete speculation yet to suggest this may happen.
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