If you believe the transfer rumours that have been flying around over the past week, Chelsea are going to buy pretty much everyone who's ever even looked kind of like an attacking player. Naturally, Stevan Jovetic was going to come up at some point. The Fiorentina man is, according to the Times, Mourinho's top target, and they're reporting that the Blues have opened up the bidding at £23 million and expect a deal to be done shortly, with Jovetic reciprocating the interest.
Although the Times seem to think that Jovetic is an alternate for Edinson Cavani, the two are very different players. Jovetic is not a pure centre forward -- he's a support striker who can play out wide. Sound familiar? Yep, he has the same sort of profile as Andre Schurrle, and should be in the same sort of price range as the German international (if a touch more expensive).
Most would, I think, prefer Jovetic to Schurrle, but I'm not entirely comfortable with picking him up. He's been injured on and off with Fiorentina this season and has been hugely inconsistent as a result. There's an argument to be made that the Viola wouldn't be much worse off if they sold him, and he seems to me the sort of player who's more hype than anything else -- although he's still obviously effective and talented.
But do Chelsea really need to go for pricey acquisitions who don't have a natural fit in the squad? Chasing Cavani, a centre forward, makes sense even at the price because he'd constitute an upgrade over Demba Ba and Fernando Torres. While Schurrle or Jovetic would give the squad an extra dimension, it's far from clear that they'd be starting week in and week out with the Blues, and I don't really understand why Chelsea seem happy to pay huge money for bit-part players.
I don't think this makes a whole lot of sense, in other words. As ever, the club might disagree.