As reported by Fabrizio Romano, Chelsea are ‘closing in on’ a deal to sign Villarreal goalkeeper Filip Jörgensen.
The Blues initial offer of around £17 million (€20 million) was rejected by the Spanish club, but Chelsea have returned with an improved offer, which Nick Purewal of the Evening Standard believes to be closer to £20 million.
Romano believes negotiations are at the final stages, so should be concluded soon, with Jörgensen already agreeing contract terms over his move to Stamford Bridge.
Since Clearlake Capital’s takeover of Chelsea, with Todd Boehly, Behdad Eghbali and José E. Feliciano running the club, they’ve spent in excess of £1 billion on new players in just two years, with Jörgensen’s impending arrival set to take this summer’s spending close to £100 million… and counting.
Omari Kellyman (19 million), Tosin Adarabioyo (free), Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall (£30 million), Renato Veiga (£11.8 million), Caleb Wiley (£8.5 million) and Marc Guiu (£6 million) have all already arrived, meaning the Blues currently have around 50 first team players currently on their books, but they are showing no signs of slowing down.
Who is Filip Jörgensen?
Filip Jörgensen is a 22 year old goalkeeper who, after bouncing around numerous clubs at youth level, including Malmö and Mallorca, has spent his entire senior career with Villarreal.
His debut came in a Copa del Rey tie against lower-tier Atlético Sanluqueño in December 2021, before having to wait over a year for his maiden La Liga outing, this against Rayo Vallecano in January last year.
Overall, he’s now made 44 appearances for el Submarino Amarillo, starting 36 La Liga matches last season, having displaced veteran Pepe Reina, who played in the cup competitions.
Jörgensen made the most saves of any goalkeeper in La Liga last season (143), 22 more than anyone else, which also saw him rank first for post-shot expected goals, which measures the difficulty of the saves he had to make.
Liam Twomey and Mario Cortegana of the Athletic reported that Olympique de Marseille were also interested in Jörgensen, but he has had his heart set on a move to West London from the oustet.
It’s not just club level where Jörgensen has a big decision to make; he’s represented both Sweden and Denmark at youth level, having been born in Lomma to a Danish father and Swedish mother, and is currently Denmark under 21’s first-choice goalkeeper, with the DBU believing he could be Kasper Schmeichel’s heir apparent.
Who will be Chelsea’s number one next season?
Even before Jörgensen joins, Chelsea already have six first-team goalkeepers in their squad: Robert Sánchez, Đorđe Petrović, Marcus Bettinelli, Lucas Bergström, Eddie Beach and Kepa Arrizabalaga, who’s returned following a loan spell at Real Madrid.
Kepa’s proposed move to Al-Ittihad in Saudi Arabia has broken down, as reported by Soham Mukherjee in Goal, but it still seems very likely that he’ll be moving on this summer.
Last season, Sánchez made 21 Chelsea appearances while Petrović played 31 times, with the latter ending last season as first choice.
However, new boss Enzo Maresca reportedly favours the Spaniard, who started their first pre-season friendly of the summer on Wednesday, a 2-2 draw with Wrexham in the San Francisco Bay Area, while Petrović has remained at Cobham due to a minor injury.
At most clubs, if they’re spending £20 million on a new goalkeeper, it would be safe to assume they’re coming in to be number one, but with Chelsea you just never know.
