Premier League team “intent on exploring a deal” which nobody expected a few weeks ago | OneFootball

Like most Chelsea transfers recently, both in and out, rumours start out sounding silly, then get very real, very fast.

Nobody believed that Renato Veiga could seriously be leaving just 6 months after we bought him, for example. When the idea was first raised 3 weeks ago it sounded silly. Yet here we are, looking at him holding up a Juventus shirt.

The same course is being taken by the Joao Felix rumours. He’s another player who only arrived in the summer, yet the initial whispers he could leave (which sounded more like wishful thinking from Chelsea fans at first) have now developed rapidly into very serious talk of a departure.

Top sources like Ben Jacobs are now in on the act, with very detailed information about where Felix might go.

Villa line up first – but Chelsea must sort Disasi future first

Chelsea signed Joao Felix from Atletico Madrid. (Photo by Ryan Hiscott/Getty Images)

Aston Villa are front of the queue, without doubt, as Jacobs points out. They are “intent on exploring a deal”. But there are two other players entangled in all this – Jhon Duran, who Chelsea want to buy, and Axel Disasi, who Villa are close to loaning from the Blues.

If they do loan Disasi, they would have to buy Felix because they couldn’t take a second loan. Meanwhile the Villains want £100m for Duran, which Chelsea obviously can’t pay, but could offset by sending Felix the other way.

For now, it all sounds too big and too expensive given there’s a week left in January. We think the Disasi loan goes through, and if they can make that into a permanent deal, then maybe Felix goes on loan too.

But the numbers required to sign Felix or Duran permanently make transfer sound very ambitious for this late in the window.