Chelsea are willing to smash their own transfer record to sign Erling Haaland from Borussia Dortmund next summer.
The Norwegian international has a £67 million release clause in his current contract, but that does not come into effect until the end of the 202- 2022 season.
It means that anybody wanting to buy him before then will have to pay a hefty premium on top of that.
Chelsea have accepted that and are prepared to way in excess of the £71,8 million they paid Athletic Bilbao for goalkeeper Kepa Arrizabalaga in 2018.
Haaland only joined Dortmund from Red Bull Salzburg at the end of 2019, for a fee of £17 million, but has since seen his value soar, and he was recently named as the second most valuable player in the world after Marcus Rashford.
He has scored 35 goals in 35 games for the Bundesliga side.
Andy is an exiled English football fan living in Cyprus. He loves all sports but football is his abiding passion, and he still has dreams every now and then about scoring the winning goal in a Wembley Cup Final, even though his playing days are long gone. He follows most major leagues, across Europe at least, and has a favoured team in each. When he’s not watching, listening, reading or downloading podcasts about football, he spend his time worrying about his beloved Arsenal.