A deal between Leipzig and Chelsea? When will the French star move?

Another wave of speculation linking Christopher Nkunku with a move to Chelsea surfaced before the January transfer window even started, and it didn’t even wait for the World Cup to end. Nkunku will not take part in that due to injury and a possible good performance will not move his price tag closer to the 100 million mark. So it seems that the clubs did not wait and have already agreed the transfer in principle. Let’s recap what we know.

Christopher Nkunku is having an excellent season. In less than 2,000 minutes, he has a 17+4 record in all competitions. That’s a goal scored every 115 minutes. Every game he’s played, he’s scored more than one goal. This continues his excellent form from last season, when he scored 20 goals and created 15 more in 34 league games.

He was rewarded for his performances last year with a new, more lucrative contract in June. It runs until 2026, so buying him out of it won’t come cheap as Leipzig are under no pressure to sell. This was no doubt also the motivation behind the contract extension.

Nkunku himself benefited from the increased salary in a situation where not only he, but also a number of other players, were reluctant to transfer and risk their minutes before the World Cup.

At the same time, it was immediately widely reported that the newly signed deal would either contain an outright exit clause, or at the very least, there was to be a gentleman’s agreement on the amount for which the club would let the player go in the next summer transfer window. Sources closer to German football were leaning more towards the second version and time seems to be giving them the benefit of the doubt.

RB management could still be hoping that the price of their talisman will be raised by his good performance at the World Cup. For that, Nkunku, who only made his debut for the French national team in March this year, was nominated and even travelled to join the French team. But there he suffered a hamstring injury and will miss the championship.

Thus, nothing prevents a transfer from being arranged. Representatives of the clubs meet regularly at the negotiating table, most recently in the summer they discussed Tim Werner’s return from London back to the club where he made his name. Chelsea’s interest in the French striker, then, is also the worst-kept secret in contemporary football. He was due to have a medical with the Blues in August.

Initially, confusion surrounded it as to whether it was a private examination for another purpose. The new reports no longer contain that ‘reportedly’ and consider the connection between the medical and the move to Chelsea a done deal.

There are now reports from several sources that the deal between the clubs is said to be done. The transfer is expected to take place in the summer, not as early as January as expected from the season opener that went wrong for Leipzig.

The East German club continue to play in the Champions League, and are back in contention for top spot in the domestic competition as well. Nkunku has been a central figure in this turnaround under Marco Rose, and given the spring prospects, his winter departure seemed unlikely even before the current information surfaced.

The agreed amount is then thought to be €70 million. Slightly more than the ‘at least 60 million’ originally envisaged, as was supposed to be part of the aforementioned gentleman’s agreement. At the same time, it is not supposed to be a signed contract at this point, but just an agreement in principle that the clubs have come to at this point. Thus, nothing is set in stone and the situation may be changed by Chelsea’s failure to qualify for next year’s millionaire competition.

Moreover, the Blues have not had the best experience with transfers of players from the German Bundesliga in recent years. Timo Werner is no longer at the club, Kai Havertz can no longer rely on his reputation as the scorer of the winning goal in the Champions League final, and there are already concerns around his performances in London.

Of course, this can be blamed on the curse of the strikers that someone inevitably had to cast at Stamford Bridge, but it should make all parties all the more wary.

At the same time, it’s impossible not to point out in this context that the Bundesliga is the competition where the most goals per game fall every year, and the offensive numbers of any players who leave here will therefore inevitably drop in their new location (please ignore Haaland here, we’re talking about people).

So, if the transfer from RB Leipzig to Chelsea London for around €70 million does materialise after this season, we can only wish they can put it to good use in England, unlike previous promising signings from Germany.

Sources: Ben Jacobs, Manuel Veth, Transfermarkt