Chelsea sign £97m wonderkid winger and Barcelona gem in blockbuster summer transfer window prediction

Over £1.8 billion spent on new players under BlueCo since 2022, and somehow Chelsea still have nowhere near the strongest squad in the Premier League. Some say the decision to sign almost exclusively promising young talent will pay off eventually once the raw signings come good, and point to the Club World Cup success last summer.

Others may suggest it’s a chronically mismanaged ticking timebomb, with a distinct lack of understanding in terms of the balance of experience and youth a Premier League squad needs to realistically compete for the title.

This summer, the pressure on decision makers at Chelsea will be immense, as Blues fans continue to air their frustrations at the club’s divisive transfer policy. There have been whispers suggesting the board could finally heed the cry for more experienced signings, but the latest transfer rumours continue to suggest the club are sticking to their guns and relentlessly targeting players of a more youthful profile.

As we await the summer transfer window’s opening in mid-June, we fired up the latest edition of Football Manager, and had the game predict exactly who the Blues would sign ahead of the 2026/27 season.

Chelsea predicted summer transfer window - players signed

Gerard Martin - £17m from Barcelona: A rather nice bit of business to get the ball rolling, as the Blues addressed their need for more cover at left-back by signing the 24-year-old Barcelona talent. Marc Cucurella is the main man in that position for the Blues, and the signing of Martin - who has played no fewer than 86 times in two seasons for the Catalan giants - as backup represents a notable shift from the Chelsea transfer team. So far, so good?

Cauan Baptistella - free agent from Metalist 1925: Oh right, we’re back to this again, are we? Yes, the Blues just couldn’t help themselves and brought in the 18-year-old midfielder upon the expiry of his contract in Ukraine. If you believe the various scrappily edited YouTube compilations out there, he’s the world’s next Brazilian superstar. Expect him to go on loan to Strasbourg for a season before being swiftly sold for £5m and then never seen again.

Malick Fofana - £96m from Lyon: My word - they’re not messing around, are they? Ninety six million great British pounds - which is more than the annual military budget of Moldova - were handed over to sign the 21-year-old left winger from Lyon. It’s huge money on, again, a relatively unproven player.

Gustavo Sa - £43m from Famalicao: That deal for Martin was just to throw us off the scent, wasn’t it? Another 21-year-old was ushered through the door for big money, giving Chelsea yet another attacking midfielder for Liam Rosenior to somehow shoehorn into his starting XI. It’s almost like they’re signing players with no thought for how they’ll actually benefit the side, merely focusing on their potential resale value in a few years time.

David Raum - £50m from RB Leipzig: There we go! An experienced player in his prime, and one who was linked with a Premier League move earlier this week, as it happens. The 27-year-old RB Leipzig skipper is a left-back, which does raise questions over the aforementioned Martin deal, but the rational thinking of his acquisition is certainly worthy of praise.

Diant Ramaj - £11m from Borussia Dortmund: Why have six goalkeepers on the books when you can seven? The jury’s out on whether the 24-year-old Albania international is the right man to succeed Robert Sanchez as Chelsea’s number one - Ramaj has a notorious penchant for taking big risks with the ball at his feet, which may well ring alarm bells for Blues fans who’ve seen plenty of that from Sanchez.

Chelsea’s predicted summer transfer window - players sold

Tosin Adarabioyo - £15m to Crystal Palace: With all those players bought, Chelsea had to start turfing some existing talent out of the door to balance the books. £15m for Tosin isn’t a bad deal, really, given that the Blues acquired him on a free transfer in the first place. At 28-years-old, he was a veritable dinosaur creaking away in Chelsea dressing room.

Axel Disasi - £19m to Fiorentina: Another defender out the door, Disasi won’t be remembered particularly fondly by the Chelsea faithful. After finishing the 2025/26 campaign with West Ham, he set off for pastures new in Serie A, seeing the Blues make a significant loss on the £39m they somehow decided to spend on him back in 2023.

Mykalo Mudryk - £3.7m to Borussia Dortmund: All of a sudden, that £20m loss on Disasi doesn’t look quite so galling. Chelsea cut their considerable, £85m losses on the Ukraine international, who is still serving a doping ban after being charged back in summer 2025. Given the wealth of wingers on the books at Stamford Bridge, there was no way back for Mudryk. The Blues will just be hoping he doesn’t join the long list of players they sold far too soon - Mohamed Salah and Kevin de Bruyne, for example.

Liam Delap - £30m to Brighton: Speaking of long Chelsea lists, Liam Delap joins the particularly lengthy record of strikers who completely flopped at Stamford Bridge after succeeding elsewhere. We could see this one happening in real life this summer, with a number of Premier League teams said to be keeping an eye on the former Ipswich forward.

Nicolas Jackson - £60m to Roma: It would be fair to say that Jackson fits the Chelsea striker flop mould as well, given his deeply frustrating first two seasons at the club. Bayern Munich wouldn’t sign him on a permanent deal, but AS Roma were certainly up for it, and saw the Blues nearly double the money they paid back in 2023.

Robert Sanchez - £13m to Roma: Petr Cech, he was not. While it would be reasonable to suggest he was often made the scapegoat for Chelsea’s all-round shambolic defending, Sanchez’s erratic displays with the ball at his feet and distinctly sub-par positional sense was the bad that far outweighed the good of his impressive shot-stopping ability.

Josh Acheampong - £18m to Brentford: The academy graduate has arguably been hard done by this season, failing to get minutes despite the starting defenders pushing new boundaries in the field of defensive buffoonery. You can’t blame him for making the short trip across west London. Farewell, sweet prince.