Chelsea repeat Estevao Willian and Kendry Paez transfer trick as deal for striker completed
Chelsea have reached an agreement for 16-year-old striker Dastan Satpaev, who will join the club in the summer of 2026, football.london understands.
The teenager from Kazakhstan will cost Chelsea around £3.3million as the Blues continue to lock down the most promising young talent in world football. Ever since Todd Boehly and Clearlake Capital bought the west London club in 2022, the plan has been very clear: to identify and buy players of a very young age for relatively modest fees and turn them into potential world beaters.
See Estevao Willian and Kendry Paez, for instance - the South American duo with a whole load of hype around their respective names. Yet to join Chelsea, Estevao and Paez are expected to link up with the club in the summer. Satpaev, meanwhile, will move to Stamford Bridge 12 months later as he continues his development in Kazakhstan.
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Chelsea will be hoping Satpaev will be their striker for years to come from 2026 onwards but there is a lot of time between now and when he does move to west London. The Blues will look to bring a centre-forward in over the 2025 summer transfer window, football.london understands, after deciding the January market was too extortionate and complicated to do so.
Benjamin Sesko and Liam Delap are both of interest to Chelsea, while Victor Osimhen remains a long-term target after failing to land him last summer. At the moment, Enzo Maresca has Nicolas Jackson, Christopher Nkunku and Marc Guiu as his options in the central striker role but two of them are injured. Jackson and Guiu both missed Saturday's defeat to Brighton because of fitness issues, although Maresca is hopeful the former will be back very soon.
The Blues were beaten 2-1 at Brighton over the weekend and Jackson's absence was particularly felt. "Yeah, sometimes I think you need to play games without players to realise how important they are," Maresca said when asked about if Chelsea missed their No.15.
"We said many times about Nico: he is important on and off the ball. Off the ball, his intensity is very good and on the ball, he is always a threat."
