Chelsea have already made two new signings from Strasbourg - but will they be able to improve a side which needs a lot of help?
Give BlueCo this much credit: From the moment that they bought out RC Strasbourg in 2023, they have been determined to exploit the French club to the fullest possible extent. Chelsea may not have European football next season, but they’ve got connections on the continent which they hope will help them get back there.
Emmanuel Emegha & Valentín Barco are both set to join Chelsea this summerplaceholder image
Emmanuel Emegha & Valentín Barco are both set to join Chelsea this summer | Getty Images
The news that Chelsea have agreed to sign Valentín Barco from Strasbourg for an undisclosed fee means that three of the Ligue 1 outfit’s regular starters could be in Xabi Alonso’s squad come August. The Blues have already completed a deal to sign striker Emanuel Emegha, while goalkeeper Mike Penders could compete for the starting goalkeeper’s job after a season on loan from Stamford Bridge. Given that these deals involve Behdad Eghbali and Todd Boehly selling and signing players amongst themselves, one certainly can’t criticise the business sense behind the deals.
Their impact on the football field remains indeterminate, however. Barco has had already had a disappointing spell in the Premier League with Brighton & Hove Albion, while Emegha spent almost the entirety of the 2025/26 campaign injured. Chelsea’s track record with transfers in the BlueCo era is also distinctly underwhelming – so will their new signings from Strasbourg actually make a real difference next season?
Has Valentín Barco improved enough since leaving Brighton?
Barco was just 19 years old when Brighton signed him in 2024, at a time when he was touted as one of the most exciting young left-back talents in world football. It never worked out at the Amex Stadium.
The Argentine made just seven appearances for Brighton and struggled to adapt to life at the top level after a promising start to his career with Boca Juniors. Exposed positionally and often far too aggressive off the ball, it didn’t help that Barco appeared to be too small and slight to compete in physical duels – at 5’8” tall, he’s certainly not the most imposing player.
Just a year after he arrived, he was sold to Strasbourg. In France, he has rebuilt his career by making a seemingly unlikely transition to midfield, where his technical quality and playmaking skill has made him a surprisingly dynamic force who scored twice and collected four assists over the course of the Ligue 1 season.
Barco, now 21, has started to look more comfortable in one-on-one tussles, less easy to bully off the ball, and has found a position in which his desire to run around the field looking for pockets of space to exploit leaves less space in behind for the opposition to make use of.
He still has his weaknesses, a tendency to overplay (and particularly to try and dribble when a pass would be the safer option) and has made his fair share of mistakes for Strasbourg. If Chelsea expect him to compete for a regular starting role he will need to learn quickly given the visible rawness in his game and the occasional immaturity of his on-field decision making – but the talent is there, and his new role as a box-to-box midfielder has started to draw the best out of him.
It isn’t yet known how much Chelsea have paid to sign Barco, although The Daily Mail note that Strasbourg are expected to make a “considerable profit” on the £7.9m they spent to sign him from the Seagulls last January. That makes it hard to estimate the scale of the gamble being taken, but there is certainly an element of risk.
Barco’s work at Strasbourg suggests a player who will make mistakes, who will take chances of his own and have some of them blow up in his face. The talent and technical class is there, but the discipline is not, and Alonso’s tactical set-up requires a degree of positional solidity from his central midfielders. It will be interesting to see how Barco gets on, but he may require quite a bit of patience from his coach and the supporters alike – and this is a support base which is understandably low on patience at the moment.
Injured Emegha may be Chelsea’s biggest summer gamble
In signing Barco to a six-year contract, Chelsea are taking a measured risk. In signing Emegha to a seven-year deal, a move which was confirmed back in September, they could be rolling the dice rather harder still.
Chelsea agreed the Emegha move back in September, shortly before he suffered a persistent hamstring injury which has plagued his season and restricted him to just four league starts – although he has managed four goals in that timeframe too. His finishing has looked sharp enough, but the sample size is scarily small and he has played just 26 minutes of top-flight football since November.
Chelsea didn’t have any reason to know that his fitness would become such a significant issue when they agreed the deal, but given that they were haggling with themselves it’s unclear why they acted with such urgency to get a deal done a year in advance. It has already backfired.
Emegha may well be fine after a full summer of rest, but he would scarcely be the first player to have his career diminished or derailed by a muscular injury which simply won’t go away.
Assuming that he is ready to go, Emegha would likely fill the space in the squad never which was never quite successfully filled by either Nicolas Jackson or Liam Delap – that of the striker who exploits high defensive lines and can use his pace and movement to attack the shoulder of the last man.
Emegha is fast, strong, direct and has a high work rate when out of possession, pressing defenders and forcing high turnovers. The issue is that he isn’t necessarily a precise finisher and undershot his expected goals total in both of his full seasons with Strasbourg to date, with his best tally being 14 goals in 29 appearances in the 2024/25 season.
In short, his scoring record is respectable but not spectacular, his CV is relatively short and he’s a player who leans quite heavily on his physical traits who has been sidelined due to an injury which can have a debilitating impact on a player’s pace. Fingers may need to be crossed.
Strasbourg’s use to Chelsea extends beyond selling their best players to them, of course. It’s a place for developing players to be sent on loan (or unwanted players in the case of Ben Chilwell) and another source of scouting data. But the success of Barco and Emegha may colour perceptions of the value of the two teams’ relationship – and both deals need a fair wind to turn out right.
Barco and Emegha are young, talented, and have the potential to be highly effective players. Whether they can contribute straight away in the manner that is need is somewhat doubtful, however. Chelsea would probably be wise not to lean on their success too hard as they prepare for next season.
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