Chelsea increase bid to £70m for Wesley Fofana, still not enough — report

Chelsea may have gotten a late start to the summer transfer window, but we’re certainly making up for lost time as of late, and our total spending has now grown north of £150m with the arrival of Marc Cucurella. But we’re not done yet, not by a longshot!

In addition to finally making some progress on a few expected departures (Marcos Alonso and Timo Werner, most notably), we remain in hot pursuit of a center back, with the current focus entirely on one Wesley Fofana.

Unfortunately, and unsurprisingly, Leicester City are in no hurry to make this happen and continue to stand firm in their resolve to keep the 21-year-old who signed a new long-term contract with them just a few months ago. They quickly knocked back our opening bid of £60m and will surely do the same with our follow-up offer of £70m — still significantly short of their £80-85m asking price.

Meanwhile, Brendan Rodgers continues to make it quite clear that Fofana isn’t going anywhere, for whatever that’s worth (probably something less than £85m).

“It’s no surprise to me there is interest in [Fofana], and [Newcastle-linked] James [Maddison] is developing into one of the top players in the Premier League.

“They need help. They have so many voices in their ears, given all the noise around it. It is important I make sure they are focused on football and enjoying the spirit of the training ground. The minute they leave training, I am sure there will be agents and every Tom, Dick and Harry trying to get hold to them.”

No, no, it’s Mr. Todd, Brendan. Todd. T-O-double-D.

“Fofana and Maddison are not for sale. These are very important players to us. We’re in a situation where we need to move some players out but that doesn’t mean getting rid of anyone, our best assets.”

-Brendan Rodgers; source: Mail

Well alright, so what’s our next move then? Do we keep upping the bid and poking them in the ribs, or do we go in with a knockout blow, or do we move on to other targets (or do we shelve this idea for next year)?