Former Chelsea boss Avram Grant is helping the Blues to sign Serbian wonderkid Lazar Markovic, according to reports in the Mirror.
The Partizan Belgrade forward is a long term target of Chelsea’s and Grant spent time at the Serbian club last season and led them to a title win, their fifth consecutively. It’s reported now that Grant is trying to help convince Markovic to move to Stamford Bridge and the 19–year-old has already been to London to meet with his countryman Branislav Ivanovic.
Markovic isn’t a player that I have seen play so I couldn’t fairly judge him but Andrea Stramaccioni, Inter Milan coach, says that he possesses exceptional qualities as well as blistering acceleration. He’s also described as a support striker, so isn’t centre forward material for the moment and has modest stats.
Inter Milan also hold an interest in Markovic but many believe that Chelsea remain the favourites for his signature and represent the most likely destination for the youngster.
CNN’s Italian sports correspondent Tancredi Palmeri revealed via his Twitter account earlier this month that the Italian club did try to hijack the deal, but to no avail and he also expects Markovic to move to West London this summer.
If the player does sign for Chelsea then I don’t imagine he will be part of the first team’s plans for next season and will likely go out on loan, like Kevin De Bruyne and Thibaut Courtois, but there are no reports of where he could potentially be sent out to at this time.
