While Enzo Maresca is clearly a big admirer of what Nicolas Jackson offers to Chelsea, there is no doubt whatsoever the Italian would like more fire power at the club.
Jackson has scored 10 Premier League goals in his second season with the club and given he was absent for two months, it is not a bad return. Good enough, though?
Maresca will be wanting the sort of numbers we see the likes of Mohamed Salah on, or Alexander Isak, Erling Haaland, Chris Wood and even Brentford duo Bryan Mbeumo and Yoane Wissa. Chelsea are – make no mistake about it – on the hunt for a new No.9 this summer but any reinforcement will hopefully, from the club’s point of view, hamper Jackson’s development and progress.
The club still have high hopes for the 23-year-old striker, who was signed from Villarreal in the summer of 2023 for around £30million. However, he is not the most clinical striker around – although that could improve in time – and he has shown signs of immaturity and a lack of discipline; emphasised by his silly red card for elbowing Sven Botman in the defeat to Newcastle United at the weekend.
Chelsea want to add competition for Jackson. football.london understands the Blues have a shortlist of centre-forward options they are pursuing ahead of the upcoming summer transfer window. On said list are Liam Delap, although there are murmurs he is close to moving to Manchester United, as well as Jonathan David, Hugo Ekitike and Benjamin Sesko.
Victor Osimhen is a bit of an outside shot at this stage. Chelsea tried and tried to get a deal over the line last summer for the in-demand Napoli striker but his wage demands proved to be the ultimate stumbling block in any move being completed. Osimhen instead moved to Galatasaray on a season-long loan deal and it comes as no surprise that the Nigerian has flourished in Istanbul – recently breaking the record for the most goals (35) scored by a foreign player in Turkey.
There is still interest in Osimhen, so nothing should be ruled out at this stage regarding Chelsea making a move but there is a reluctance to meet his enormous wage demands. The Chelsea of years ago under Roman Abramovich would not have thought twice about paying Osimhen what he wanted, but this is a very different club nowadays.
Under Todd Boehly and Clearlake Capital, Chelsea tend to look for young stars on lower wages and spread the transfer fees over long-term contracts. Another thing with Osimhen is he is 27 in December and while that is by no means old, especially in football nowadays, he is the most senior option on the shortlist that Paul Winstanley and Laurence Stewart, with the help of Maresca, have gathered.
There is also the argument that signing Osimhen could completely block Jackson at Stamford Bridge. All being well, Chelsea will be playing Champions League football next season and while Maresca has used European competition to rotate his squad this term, it is a different scenario against the elite sides in the continent. Osimhen, make no mistake, will want to be Chelsea’s main man – and if the club did decide to pay him the sort of salary he is after, it would make no sense for him to be rotating too often with Jackson.
The wage demands are prohibitive from Chelsea’s point of view, which makes this deal probably the most unlikely of all the striker options this summer. The fact that a move for the Nigerian has not been ruled out completely by sources, though, makes it an interesting situation and definitely one to keep an eye on over the coming months.
