Chelsea agree personal terms with Villarreal striker Nicolas Jackson — report

Nicolas Jackson finished the season in red hot form, with nine goals in his last eight La Liga matches, and he’s now leveraged that into a lucrative deal with Chelsea, agreeing personal terms with the Blues and “committing” to us, according to The Athletic.

Of course, personal terms are just part of the process, and probably the easy part in most cases. It is only now that we “intent” to negotiate with Jackson’s current club, Villarreal, over a potential transfer fee. The soon-to-be 22-year-old does have a release clause, as all contracts in Spain and Portugal do, set at €35m, but it sounds like we want to avoid having to pay that (and the associated massive taxes) and hope to instead strike a deal directly with The Yellow Submarine.

Jackson obviously represents a cheaper alternative to other potential attacking reinforcements this summer (such as Victor Osimhen and his nine-figure fee), though he’s also a much bigger risk seeing as how he’s had one half-season of greatness so far in his young career.