Chelsea want Fàbregas to sign contract extension amid Manchester United interest — report

An EXCLUSIVE from Matt Hughes in The Times claims that Chelsea are ‘ready to offer’ Cesc Fàbregas a new one-year contract extension, citing supposed interest from José Mourinho and Manchester United to help move the deal along. The length of the new extension is explained with Chelsea’s long-standing policy of giving only one-year deals to players over 30.

There is just one problem.

Well, two problems.

One is that Fàbregas is already 30 years old and he still has 18 months left on the original deal he signed when he arrived in 2014. His current contract doesn’t expire until the summer of 2019. If he signs a new one-year deal, he will have just pulled an Antonio and signed new terms without actually extending his contractually obligated stay at the club.

The other problem is that if we are to take the rumor as an extension added on to the current deal (i.e. turning 18 months into 30 months), then that would fall afoul of the cited club policy for the 30 and over crowd. Not even John Terry was allowed to skirt this rule, signing one-year deals in the final months of his existing contract in 2014, 2015, and 2016.

While I don’t expect Fàbregas to be able to do what JT couldn’t, it should be noted that Cesc has played in every single game of the season so far, except the one for which he was suspended, and he’s started all but two of them (the two League Cup games). He’s certainly come a long way since this time last season, when most expected him to be on his way sooner rather than later.

How long will he stay? Only he knows, if anyone. But for now, I don’t think he’s in any danger of signing an extension with Chelsea however.