Chelsea sign Joao Felix on loan from Atletico Madrid

By Tom Carnduff

Football

Tue January 17, 2023 · 2y ago

Chelsea have completed the signing of forward Joao Felix on loan from Atletico Madrid for the remainder of the season.

The 23-year-old joins on temporary terms, with the Blues paying a reported £9.5m fee to secure his services.

Felix remains the fourth-most expensive transfer in history, with Atletico paying £112.9m to bring him to the Spanish capital in July 2019.

He's struggled for game time this season though, completing a total of 741 minutes in La Liga - with four goals and three assists on his tally.

Despite this, the forward is averaging 0.69 expected goal involvements (xGI) per 95 minutes, not far shy of last season’s 0.77.

Joao Felix said: ‘Chelsea is one of the great teams in the world and I hope to help the team reach their objectives, so I am very, very happy to be here and very excited to play at Stamford Bridge."

Chelsea made nine signings in the summer to mark the beginning of the Todd Boehly era at Stamford Bridge - Raheem Sterling, Kalidou Koulibaly, Marc Cucurella, Gabriel Slonina, Carney Chukwuemeka, Cesare Casadei, Wesley Fofana, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang and Denis Zakaria.

January looks set to be another busy month, with Felix joining Benoît Badiashile, David Fofana and Andrey Santos in making the switch to Chelsea during the winter window.