Todd Boehly aims for Haaland transfer repeat as Chelsea reach agreement with key target
Chelsea are not the first club that have tried to tempt Christoph Freund away from Red Bull Salzburg. Eintracht Frankfurt considered an approach for the 45-year-old last year. And RB Leipzig – Salzburg’s sister club in Germany – was also mooted as a potential destination for the sporting director 12 months ago.
The ownership group has a long-term vision for Chelsea, one in which careful and strategic squad planning and considered player development are crucial. There are few better qualified to oversee such a project than Freund, which is why the Blues have made their move.
However, according to reports via football london, this understands that after a series of talks which started last month, Freund has agreed to take up the role of sporting director at Stamford Bridge, where he would work alongside new head coach Graham Potter, also recruited to help fulfil Boehly and Eghbali’s ambitious plan.
Further-more, It was under Rangnick that Salzburg established itself as one of the shrewdest clubs in the transfer market. A laser-focused team of scouts identified players between the ages of 16 and 19 that could be signed, given an opportunity to improve and impress, and then moved on for a significant fee.
Sadio Mane was the first household name to go through the process. Plenty more have followed during Freund’s time, including Kevin Kampl, Marcel Sabitzer, Naby Keita, Dayot Upamecano, Konrad Laimer, Duje Caleta-Car, Takumi Minamino, and most notably Erling Haaland.
“We work with young players and we sell players who play two or three years in our club and do very well,” Freund explained in 2019. “For us, it’s important that we speak with young players, their agents and their parents, we can show them a lot of players who come here, not with big names, but now they’re playing in big leagues and this is very important for us as a club.
“We want, not want, but we sell the players to give them the opportunity to make the next step to a bigger club and for sure we are very proud.”
Given the quality of the players handled by Freund and the inevitable transfer discussions, it’s little surprise he has developed relationships with many of his fellow recruitment specialists across the European game. One of those is understood to be Michael Edwards, who often pursued players in the Red Bull group while at Liverpool.
Edwards was approached by Boehly and Eghbali earlier this summer over a recruitment role at Chelsea. However, he turned down their advances, and thus far the 43-year-old has stood firm on his desire to spend a year out of the game after departing from Anfield at the end of last season.
Given the ambitions of Boehly, it’s unlikely Freund will be the club’s last attempted hire for their recruitment team. Last week at the SALT conference, the Chelsea chairman explained why he felt multi-club ownership would be ideal to develop young players for the Blues first-team squad.
It’s understood Boehly wanted a new sporting director in place at Chelsea ahead of the World Cup in Qatar, which begins in late November. Should an agreement be struck with Salzburg for Freund, that ambition should become a reality. Then the hard work begins.
Reports claims that the early discussions have already been held over potential midfield targets for next summer. The long-term situation with Chelsea’s goalkeeper situation is also being focused on. And unlike years past, efforts will be made to move players on permanently rather than enter a loan cycle.
Should he arrive as anticipated, Freund would naturally feed into and eventually lead those discussions heading into the January transfer window. Boehly, who acted as interim sporting director in the summer, would take a step back and instead focus on other aspects of the club, something that was always planned once the right people were in place in key positions.