Chelsea have been ridiculed for their transfer spending over the past couple of years, but it’s all starting to come together, aligning and pointing toward a future of promise and success.
There’s no question that Chelsea are a little top-heavy. Enzo Maresca controls one of the most exciting attacking lines in all of football, but there’s synergy yet to be unearthed at Stamford Bridge.
Don’t think it’ll be plain sailing from this point, but there’s little question that a gloomy atmosphere has been turned on its head and that Chelsea might just be at the foot of an upward slant.
Things are coming together, stars are starting to level up; forgetting the machine that is Cole Palmer, Nicolas Jackson has been on fire at the start of the season, and might just be growing into one of the division’s finest.
Why Chelsea signed Nicolas Jackson
Chelsea signed Jackson from La Liga outfit Villarreal in July 2023 when a fee in excess of his £30m release clause was paid. He’d ended the 2021/22 campaign excellently, with ten goals from 11 games.
His first term in west London saw 14 Premier League goals netted, which is nothing to be sniffed out, but Jackson also struggled to make good use of the myriad chances that arrived at his feet, missing 24 big chances in the top flight, to be exact.
The striker’s up-and-down performances last year still bred a healthy goal return, but he really does look to have bloomed into a new, more formidable iteration this term, having already posted four goals and three assists from only six Premier League games.
Former Chelsea striker Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink even claimed that he could become a £150m player, such is his potential.
Imagine if Chelsea had opted for a different route, and had signed Dusan Vlahovic instead.
When Chelsea wanted Dusan Vlahovic
Chelsea and then manager Mauricio Pochettino had been locked in protracted talks with Juventus in the summer of 2023 as they looked for a way to cash in on Vlahovic in a potential £42m + deal and take the Blues’ Romelu Lukaku in return, but it didn’t work out.
Too many obstacles, too many potential ifs and buts. The Serbian sharpshooter is a good player, a clinical striker, but he doesn’t have the same potential as Chelsea’s Senegalese centre-forward.
Last season, Vlahovic scored 18 goals from 38 matches in all competitions, but the bulk of this arrived in a purple patch in the Serie A that saw him harvest ten goals across nine games.
One that got away
The transfers that nearly happened but never did. This article is part of Football FanCast's One That Got Away series.
He also notched four from four to start the season, so you can see that there were some sizeable dry spells throughout.
2024/25
6
4
0
2023/24
33
16
3
2022/23
27
10
2
2021/22
36
24
5
2020/21
37
21
2
Injuries and struggles since leaving Fiorentina for Juventus in 2022 have seen him struggle for former veins of consistency in front of goal, but the 24-year-old is still a high-class striker, having even been said to have “bit of Didier Drogba” about him by journalist Paul Brown.
Jackson, aged 23, seems to be on a different trajectory from his Serbian positional peers – he’s more dynamic, more creative and plays with crispness and progression in his dribbling, ranking among the top 17% of forwards across Europe’s top five leagues over the past year for pass completion and the top 12% for successful take-ons per 90, as per FBref.
Vlahovic might have Drogba-esque qualities in that he’s physical and intelligent with sharp link-up play, but Jackson is proving that he can emulate Chelsea’s iconic No. 11, and fire Maresca’s project to new heights.
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