According to The Sunday Times, Chelsea made a last ditch attempt to snatch Anthony Martial from the grasps of Manchester United in the final days of the transfer window.
Louis van Gaal’s Manchester United side signed Martial on deadline day, making him the most expensive teenager of all time when they paid AS Monaco £36m plus a significant amount of performance related add-ons. However, Chelsea were more than willing to match the fee in an attempt to hijack the deal and bring the 19-year-old to West London.
As a measure of how highly rated the forward is at Chelsea, if all the add-on payments of his United deal are activated, Martial’s fee will be the fourth highest of all time. This news comes just a fortnight after Roman Abramovich trumped the Red Devils on the signing of Pedro Rodriguez from Barcelona.
Chelsea has struggled for form in the early stages of the season and have consequently splashed the cash, signing the aforementioned Pedro, Baba Rahman, Papy Djilobodji and Michael Hector in the closing weeks of the transfer window.
The signing of Anthony Martial, who has been touted as ‘the new Thierry Henry’ would have added strength in depth towards the higher end of the pitch. A pacey striker who can play on both wings, Martial could have offered competition for places in a number of positions in Jose Mourinho’s title-winning side.
Martial made his debut for France on Saturday, coming off the bench in their 1-0 win over Portugal.
