Chelsea receive a blow in their bid to sign Dortmund striker Youssoufa Moukoko
According to local newspaper Ruhr Nachrichten (h/t Evening Standard), Chelsea have received a blow in their bid to sign Youssoufa Moukoko as Borussia Dortmund are close to agreeing on a new contract with him.
The German international, who was part of the national team squad that got knocked out of the World Cup in the group stage itself, is currently having his contract expire with Dortmund at the end of this season (Transfermarkt).
A few days ago, it was reported in The Athletic (subscription required) that Chelsea have done the groundwork to sign Moukoko in the summer window, and could also push for a January move after losing Armando Broja for the rest of this season due to an ACL injury.
But, now it seems Dortmund have stepped up their efforts to make the teenager stay at Signal Iduna Park beyond next summer.
Transfer Expert Fabrizio Romano confirmed that Chelsea will be looking to sign a striker in January after that Broja news. It remains to be seen what options they have.
Moukoko definitely could have been one, even though he recently just turned 18. After slowly progressing through the ranks at Dortmund, the German has started getting regular game time for the senior team since the beginning of this season.
The youngster has responded very well to that to be fair to him. He scored six goals and assisted four in 14 Bundesliga appearances before the World Cup break.
Some of his attributes are a high pace to trouble the last line of defence, a great sense of finding space in the box, finishing chances well and dropping deep to mix the game up and make defenders go out of position.
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Even if we keep the sad injury to Broja aside, we saw how Chelsea struggled for goals in the opening half of this season. The numbers nines, Broja included, did not score enough goals to win or draw games from losing positions. So, signing a striker makes sense irrespective of the setback to the Albania international this week.