No pressure, Raphinha! From Lukaku to Torres – Chelsea’s biggest signings have been a disaster
Martin Macdonald
- 23 Feb 2022 06:58 CST
- 5 min read
Chelsea are poised to make a move for Leeds Utd winger Raphinha this summer.
The 25-year-old has two release clauses in his contract for any suitors to trigger.
He currently has a minimum fee release clause of €75m, which means that Leeds cannot stop any club that bids that amount.
However, if Leeds are relegated to the Championship, his release clause fee will drop to €25m.
Chelsea will likely be extremely active in the summer transfer market as they look to freshen up their forward line, with none of Romelu Lukaku, Timo Werner, Hakim Ziyech, Christian Pulisic or Kai Havertz proving world-class for the club as of yet.
Havertz has performed the best from that group, scoring the winner in the Champions League final last season.
Should Raphinha arrive at Stamford Bridge, there will certainly be pressure on him to succeed where others have failed, as the majority of Chelsea's huge money signings have disappointed...so far.
TRENDING
Kepa Arrizabalaga - £71m (from Athletic Bilbao, 2018)
Due to their policy of only fielding players from the Basque region, it’s extremely expensive to pry players away from Athletic Bilbao, as Chelsea found out with Kepa Arrizabalaga.
A world-record fee for a goalkeeper was agreed as the club needed a replacement for the Real Madrid-bound Thibaut Courtois, but it’s not gone to plan.
Under Sarri, Kepa was average at best; he wasn’t awful, he looked promising, but certainly not world class. In 2019/20, however, it was another story.
He had the lowest save percentage of goalkeepers in the league, conceding 47 Premier League goals whilst making just 1.7 saves per 90, the least of any ‘keeper with more than one appearance in the league.
Romelu Lukaku - £97.7m (From Inter, 2021)
While it may have seemed odd on paper for Chelsea to spend so much money on a player they once had on their books as a young prospect, the signing of Lukaku in the summer of 2021 was undoubtedly a statement transfer from the club.
After dominating Italian football with Inter with 64 goals in 95 games over the course of two seasons and helping the club win their first Serie A title in 10 years, Lukaku returned to English football as one of the best strikers in world football and with a new point to prove.
He took just 15 minutes into his second debut to find the back of the net, away against Arsenal.
Lukaku's performances have fell away as the season has gone on, while he sent shockwaves through the club by expressing regret at having left Inter.
He recently broke a record for having the least amount of touches (seven) for a starting Premier League player since Opta records began in a match against Crystal Palace.
Alvaro Morata - £60m (from Real Madrid, 2017)
Alvaro Morata was never a consistent regular at Real Madrid, but the form he displayed on loan at Juventus, and during his fleeting appearances for Los Blancos, suggested that he was a talismanic figure with expert instincts in the box.
That forced Abramovich’s hand, even though Antonio Conte publicly stated he wanted Romelu Lukaku, and Morata was signed. It started so well for the club-record signing (at the time), he netted once and grabbed an assist, as well as scoring a disallowed goal, as he almost inspired a comeback off the bench against Burnley on his Premier League debut.
He scored 15 goals and assisted six in 30 starts in all competitions in his first season, but poor finishing in his second year, and just five Premier League goals in 2018/19, saw him loaned to Atletico Madrid for £16m, before they signed him for just over £30m as was agreed.
Christian Pulisic - £57m (from Dortmund, 2019)
Christian Pulisic is yet to live up to expectations as a Chelsea player since his big-money move from Borussia Dortmund.
Though the signs are promising for the United States international as he displays a turn of speed, a speed of thought on the ball and a dribbling ability that not many players in the Premier League possess.
He has been inconsistent so far, scoring just 16 goals in the league across his first two-and-a-half seasons.
But, on his day, he can be brilliant.
Fernando Torres - £50m (from Liverpool, 2011)
Fernando Torres was a roaring success at Liverpool, with 69 goals in his three-and-a-half seasons there, but he never hit the same heights at Chelsea.
A warning sign should’ve come with his injury issues, and the fact that whilst he netted 18 league goals in just 1,717 minutes in 2009/10, Torres was on the decline in 2010/11.
Chelsea still forked out an English record fee at the time to acquire his services, and although he netted that famous goal at the Camp Nou, he ultimately didn’t live up to expectations.
It took him nearly 1,000 minutes to net his first Chelsea goal, and whilst 45 goals and 35 assists in 175 appearances isn’t awful (a goal contribution roughly every 2.2 games), he simply wasn’t as good as the club had hoped he would be.
Timo Werner - £47.5m (from RB Leipzig, 2020)
The enigma that is Timo Werner. The German was signed in the summer of 2020 after a fabulous goalscoring season with RB Leipzig in which he smashed in 34 goals in 42 appearances in all competitions.
In his debut season with Chelsea, he scored less than half of that.
So, in goalscoring terms he has certainly been a disappointment, regularly missing golden opportunities in front of goal.
But, his performances and sheer will have, on the whole, been impressive as he works his backside off for the team. There is a reason why he is continually selected, or at least he was before Lukaku arrived.
