Report: Antonio Conte, Chelsea on Collision Course Over Transfer Target Dispute
Chelsea manager Antonio Conte is in a "stand-off" with the club's decision makers over transfer business going forward following a difficult summer for the reigning Premier League champions.
The Times report on Tuesday that Conte has drawn up a list of five transfer targets he wants to bring in before the transfer deadline later this month, but the club are opposed given the list contains several players with little-to-no resale value in lieu of their age.
Conte is looking to sign Swansea's Fernando Llorente, Manchester United target Ivan Perisic, Antonio Candreva from Inter, and 26-year-old pair Alex Sandro and Virgil van Dijk from Juventus and Southampton, respectively. However, the report claims that Chelsea are balking at deals for most of the players because of the high fees and expected drop in value in the coming years.
A separate report from the Mirror claims that Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich is looking to spend £120m on Van Dijk, as well as Arsenal's Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Leicester City's Danny Drinkwater. The difference in targets could come as some sort of explanation for Chelsea's lack of activity in the transfer market so far this summer.
The club fielded a bench containing a number of youth players for the season opener against Burnley on Saturday - a match in which they lost 3-2 at Stamford Bridge - seemingly highlighting the problem of a lack of squad depth ahead of a predictably strenuous league and Champions League campaign over the coming months.
Perisic, 28, Llorente, 32, and Candreva, 30, are all believed to be available for the right price, but Chelsea's position on signing older players is now thought to have changed this summer and it's causing issues between Conte and the club - with Conte even believed to hold personal tension with some of his staff over his "incessant demands" on the training ground.
Conte has been shortened to favourite to be the first manager to walk away from their job this season, such is the ongoing tension at Stamford Bridge.
