The bold £25m Newcastle United transfer hijack over Chelsea that could seal bargain signing of the summer

For a few days, it looked a lot like Chelsea planned to expand their ever-growing goalkeeper collection. They wanted AC Milan’s Mike Maignan, by reputation one of the best shot stoppers in Europe – but now, it seems as though their bid will collapse. That’s probably not a bad thing.

Reporting from a number of outlets, including The Daily Mail, suggests that Milan were demanding around £25m for the services of the 29-year-old Frenchman, on paper a pretty good price for such a well-regarded player. For once, however, Chelsea seem determined to curb their instincts to spend at every opportunity, and are unwilling to spend even half of that price tag. The deal seems to be dying.

But why might the failure to sign one of Europe’s biggest names in a key position be a blessing in disguise for the Blues – and why should other teams simultaneously see their opening as an opportunity to good to pass up?

Why Chelsea simply don’t need Mike Maignan

To start with, it’s worth noting that Maignan is not coming off the back of a strong season. This was Milan’s worst league performance in a decade – they finished eighth – and the goalkeeper wasn’t a standout performer. More troublingly, it was his second down year in the last three.

Granted, Maignan was excellent in 2023/24, and before that was not only quite brilliant but instrumental in both Milan’s Scudetto triumph in 2021/22 and Lille’s shock Ligue 1 win the season prior. There is, however, an extent to which the reputation earned from those two years may be inflating English perceptions of his performance levels since, given how little Serie A football is shown on these shores.

Still, Maignan has been a brilliant and highly reliable shot stopper more often than not over the past five or six years and is one of best sweeper-keepers in the game – he is hugely comfortable with the ball at his feet regardless of the amount of pressure placed on him, and comes further out of his box more often, more effectively than almost any other glovesman in the elite echelons of the game.

In other words, there is every case for a team who play a high line to take a chance on signing him and restoring him to his best form. He’ll turn 30 before the new season starts, but that’s no age for a goalkeeper and there is every chance of getting several seasons of high-level football out of him. But for Chelsea, who are so rarely hesitant to meet an asking price, not splashing out on Maignan may be an unusually sensible move.

That has less to do with Maignan and where he is in his career than it does with the goalkeepers that Chelsea already have – not just in terms of quantity, but in terms of quality. Current starter Robert Sánchez has become distinctly maligned by the fan base, not least due to a number of high-profile ricks which cost Chelsea goals over the course of the season. The data behind his performances, however, is rather better than might be expected.

For starters, his 76.4% save percentage was the highest in the Premier League all season – and while that partly reflects the quality of the shots he faced (eight goalkeepers who started regularly prevented more goals compared to the xG opposing strikers enjoyed), it also reflects the fact that for the Spaniard did better work than the common perception might appreciate.

Similarly, while he was responsible for some bad moments from crosses – conceding goals against Brighton and Wolves when he flapped at a ball he was never claiming and failed to deal with a set piece placed under the bar respectively – he successfully dealt with 12.7% of all crosses played into his box in the Premier League this season, an extremely high mark bettered only by David Raya and Aro Murić.

In short, the mistakes that Sánchez has made (and there have been several, many of them especially bad) have perhaps tilted the public perception of his performances too far. That isn’t to say that Chelsea can’t do better – they can – more that a goalkeeper may not be such a crucial area of improvement as some supporters believe.

That’s made even clearer when one looks at the other options in the squad. Even ignoring depth options who are likely to be out on loan or in the squad more as coaches than players (Gabriel Slonina, Marcus Bettinelli and so on), Chelsea have players who could be worth a look if Sánchez does struggle next season.

Filip Jörgensen, only signed last summer, wasn’t great in his six Premier League appearances but was outstanding in the Europa Conference League, making 83.7% of his saves in that competition and dealing with an astonishing number of crosses while playing well outside of his area.

Then there’s Đorđe Petrović, the forgotten man who was loaned out to sister club RC Strasbourg and performed magnificently, making 78.9% of his saves, preventing a remarkable 10 goals more than the xG he faced suggested he should have, and looking comfortable in the sweeper role and in the air. The Serbian comfortably outperformed Maignan over the last year, playing at a broadly similar level.

And lest we forget, Chelsea have already spent £17m to sign Genk goalkeeper Mike Penders, who spent last season on loan with the Belgian club, put up a save percentage of over 80% and looked every inch like a future number one. He will likely be loaned out again this year, but putting him behind yet another goalkeeper would be an idiosyncratic decision giving the investment already made.

Chelsea have a first-choice goalkeeper who isn’t as bad as people think, several talented options who could easily be the long-term solution on the books, and don’t need to spend on a goalkeeper with a big name but who hasn’t been his old self of late. They have plenty of other positions to address before they try to make a minimal gain between the sticks, even if the cost isn’t all that substantial by current standards.

Why Newcastle United should consider a move for Mike Maignan

What the whole story has taught us, at least, is that Maignan is for sale, and at a price that shouldn’t set too high of a barrier to Premier League sides. Chelsea may not need him, but other side could.

Newcastle seem like the obvious candidate. They appear keen to replace Nick Pope following a string of injuries, and in any case there were always question marks over Pope’s suitability for Howe’s system, particularly considering that he was never quite as comfortable as his manager wanted outside the box.

Maignan is extremely happy to come out of his area and form the first line of defence and to set off quick counter-attacks, something which should suit Newcastle down to the ground – and while one can query the quality of his work between the sticks last season, he has a track record which proves that he is capable of being a brilliant shot-stopper with the right coaching.

Newcastle, for their part, appear to be more interested in James Trafford. Age and cost may be factors (although it’s unlikely that Trafford will be considerably cheaper than Maignan at £25m), but Maignan has good years left on him and Trafford – although unquestionably talented, level-headed and a brilliant shot-stopper – comes with some of the same queries as Pope in terms of his ability to be effective outside of the box and to play behind an aggressive high line.

Not that Trafford is bad outside his box, but to put it in perspective, Maignan was responsible for nearly 60% more defensive actions outside of his area last season than Trafford was for Burnley, and on average took those actions four yards further downfield with a pass completion rate that was 13% higher. Trafford is a decent sweeper-keeper. Maignan is on a different level.

Manchester United may take a look, too, although they have played with a slightly deeper line so far under Ruben Amorim and perhaps don’t need a specialist sweeper-keeper in the same way that Newcastle or Chelsea might, and no doubt Maignan’s name recognition and past achievements might spark interest elsewhere – but in the final analysis, recent performances suggest that splashing out on the Frenchman is more of a gamble than might be appreciated, and not one that Chelsea need to take right now.

Maybe none of Chelsea’s current crop live up to the stats behind their performances over the past year or two. Maybe Sánchez is as bad as those mistakes made him seem, perhaps Petrović was a flash in the pan in France, maybe Jörgensen never makes it past being a Conference League king and Penders is just too green. But all of them have shown that they could be worth the jersey – and save Chelsea some money when they need to spend it in so many other places.