New twist in £30m midfielder transfer rumour from Nizaar Kinsella | OneFootball

We wrote yesterday about the rumours gathering steam that Chelsea were keen on buying James McAtee from Nottingham Forest.

It makes sense – he’s a former Man City youth player, still 23 and likely available pretty cheap as he’s not getting a game at Nottingham Forest after a summer move there. However the details that have come out since then make even more sense.

Youngster wanted by Strasbourg rather than Chelsea

According to Kieran Gill of the Daily Mail and other sources including Nizaar Kinsella, the interest from BlueCo is real, but it’s not for Chelsea.

It’s actually our sister club Strasbourg who are interested in McAtee, and it would be on a loan basis rather than a permanent deal. Given he cost almost £30m in the summer, that makes a lot of sense. There would likely be a clause to potentially make the deal permanent, but even with BlueCo helping it’s hard to see Strasbourg’s budget stretching that far.

This idea makes more sense than a Chelsea move – if he can’t get a game for Forest, we struggle to see him getting one for the Blues. Strasbourg would provide a great platform for him to be a star player and get his career back on track, with games in Europe to boot. However given there will certainly be Premier League interest in him, one wonders if he will be willing to go to Ligue 1.

In other news…

Reece James has become more and more of a leader for this Chelsea team, speaking out after defeats and gradually turning into the inspirational figure that Enzo Maresca said he wanted him to be.

James has now hit the one year mark of staying fit after his latest return from injury, and the Athletic had a look at how the captain has managed it, along with help from the club.