Chelsea have been long linked with Napoli centre-back Kalidou Koulibaly and ahead of the summer transfer window, some reports have claimed the Senegalese international will finally make the move to Stamford Bridge.
According to Spanish journalist Guillem Balague, Chelsea won’t pursue a deal for Koulibaly due to Napoli’s asking price in excess of £100 million for the 28 year old defender.
Balague said on his YouTube channel: “Basically any link like with Koulibaly of Napoli, or any other big player, will face the impossibility of No. 1: raising the money, and No. 2: spending that kind of money that’s necessary to get a player like this because nobody wants to make a huge investment into a player. That’s quite clear.
“Neither PSG, Real Madrid, Barcelona, Chelsea, Manchester United, Manchester City – nobody wants to put £100m on a player. “He’s more, £100m-plus is what Koulibaly will cost, so forget about that.
“Chelsea have got a priority, of course, full-back No. 1 and No. 2 quite clearly they want a striker. That would be the biggest thing, to get a striker.
“How will the market work? Swap deals, loan deals, free agents will be a priority for everyone and those swaps will be interesting because it will mean putting a tag on those players that obviously both clubs would have to agree on, and that will be one of the difficulties.
“Those are the difficulties that the market will face so the likes of Koulibaly I don’t think it can happen, not this summer.”