The latest capture to get over the line is that of Valentin Barco. He who incensed Jude Bellingham at the World Cup has swapped one BlueCo-owned club in Strasbourg for another.
Is Barco an Alonso or a club signing?
It isn't clear at this point if Xabi Alonso had requested the signing, or if this was one put upon him as part of the arrangement that exists between the Ligue 1 and Premier League clubs.
The 22-year-old Argentine does have previous English top-flight experience, having played a handful of games for Brighton & Hove Albion, though in his short career, he's already been at Boca Juniors, the Seagulls, Sevilla and Strasbourg before this most recent move.
For a player who has only managed to make 111 appearances in all competitions during his five-year career to date, that doesn't necessarily bode well for Alonso.
Perhaps the Spaniard sees something in Barco's ability to create almost one chance in every game (107 to date), and a pass completion rate that's never dropped below 71.43%, but has generally hovered in the mid-80s range.
Brilliant tackle success
Or maybe it's the tigerish way that he approaches games, which has allowed him to win back possession on 367 separate occasions, contest a mammoth 791 one-on-one duels (with a success rate of 57.36% last season), and win 107 of the 174 tackles he's attempted, losing just 67 across his career to date.
Either way, Chelsea fans will get to see exactly what he's made of once the season kicks off in earnest, and it will be interesting to see how much more successful this Premier League sojourn will be, compared to his last down on the south coast.
Before the beginning of the 26/27 campaign, he could be joined by Rayo Vallecano left-back Pep Chavarria.
The 28-year-old has reportedly already agreed personal terms with the Blues, though Rayo Vallecano wants €25m for his services, and Chelsea had originally only offered €15m.
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Bid increased to €20m
With news that the West Londoners have since upped their bid to €20m, and with Chavarria having been left out of Rayo's pre-season games, that would suggest a move to the English capital could be imminent for a player who will slot into the space that Marc Cucurella vacated when signing for Real Madrid earlier this summer.
Of the 44 games that Chavarria played for Rayo last season, he started in 37 of them, enjoying 3,518 cumulative minutes on the pitch.
In those matches, he made 73 tackles, winning 44 of them, for a tackle success rate as high as 68.75%. With 42 interceptions and 41 headed clearances to boot, the defender clearly earned his salary in 2025/26.
Passing-wise, he was excellent, and that will also certainly appeal to Alonso.
More than 1,600 passes were attempted throughout the campaign, and 1,356 found their target, earning Chavarria an impressive 84.59% completion stat.
Chavarria needs to be more decisive in the final third
One area that he will need to improve upon is his ability to get forward and support the front men. That was something which Cucurella did with aplomb, but Chavarria managed only 20 successful take-ons in those 111 games last season.
Of those, not one saw him able to enter the opposition box, and if Alonso is going to play a similar system to that which his predecessors have done, he will want his full-backs raiding down the channels as often as possible.
He did at least manage 321 progressive carries of the ball, and 178 of those were as a result of having a 10+ carry - denoted by the player taking the ball at least 10 yards closer to the opponent's goal.
Chavarria may find the pace of the Premier League a wake-up call initially, but there's only one way to deal with it, and that's for Alonso to throw him in at the deep end and see if he'll sink or swim.
Either way, both he and Barco are likely to provide exactly the competitive edge that their manager is looking for, and only time will tell if both end up being studious acquisitions or otherwise.
Jason Pettigrove has been the features writer for Flashscore since 2025, utilising Opta data to form the basis of his articles. He has previously worked for high profile football clubs, news and media outlets, both in print and digital, and can usually be found watching FC Barcelona when time permits. You can read more of his pieces here.
