It is the summer of 2021 and Chelsea, the reigning European champions, are in the final stages of concluding their club-record deal to bring Romelu Lukaku back to Stamford Bridge. The fee being paid to Inter Milan is excessive – £97.5million – yet there are few concerns with Marina Granovskaia on track to recoup a similar figure through player sales.
Those who have already been sacrificed for sizeable fees are academy graduates: Fikayo Tomori to AC Milan for £25million; Marc Guehi to Crystal Palace in a deal worth up to £20million; Tino Livramento to Southampton for £5million. Tammy Abraham will head to Roma for £34million imminently, while Ike Ugbo is in the process of securing a £5million switch to Genk.
There are further homegrown exits too with the likes of Lewis Bate off to Leeds United, Myles Peart-Harris heading down the road to Brentford, and Dynel Simeu linking up with Southampton. Admittedly, these are not transfers that hugely bolster the Lukaku transfer fund.
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Fast forward to the present day and the Chelsea landscape is very different. The club is no longer owned by Roman Abramovich and Granovskaia has departed. Petr Cech has gone as technical director. And even Thomas Tuchel, the mastermind behind the 2021 Champions League win, is no longer in situ.
Lukaku has moved on too. Well, temporarily at least. After a campaign in which he suffered an ankle injury, gave a hugely ill-advised interview, fell out with Tuchel, lost his place in the starting XI and still scored 15 goals in all competitions, he returned to Inter on a season-long loan.
As things stand, the Belgian is due to return to Chelsea next summer. Whether that happens will be down to new co-owners Todd Boehly, Behdad Eghbali and Jose Feliciano – although there have been suggestions from those close to the trio that an agreement for Lukaku to remain at Inter for a second year has already been outlined.
The future of the striker is not the only big transfer call those within the Chelsea ownership will have to make ahead of the 2023/24 season. There are also two impending decisions as to whether to buy back two players sold by Granovskaia to fund the Lukaku signing.
Undoubtedly the more high profile – and certainly the more expensive – is Abraham. When Chelsea agreed to sell the academy graduate to Roma, they negotiated a £67million buyback clause which becomes active in July 2023. It was an understandable move on Chelsea's part given Abraham had scored 30 goals in two seasons.
To the surprise of very few, Abraham has continued to find the net regularly at Roma. The England international struck 27 times in his debut campaign and played a key role as Jose Mourinho's side won the Europa Conference League.
This term, the 24-year-old has started slowly with just two goals in Roma's opening eight games. Yet any genuine doubts about his goalscoring prowess are long gone. The same can't be said for the majority of Chelsea's forwards, who have struggled to produce consistently in the final third since Abraham's departure.
Lukaku was followed out the door this summer by Timo Werner, who scored just 11 times last season. Kai Havertz ended 2021/22 with 14 goals to his name, although only eight came in the Premier League. Christian Pulisic and Hakim Ziyech, meanwhile, managed eight apiece in all competitions.
It's clear Chelsea require a reliable goalscorer; Abraham has proved himself that. Whether he would fit into Graham Potter's tactical vision is a matter of debate – and some may feel the smarter bet is investing more time and energy into Armando Broja, who is three years Abraham's junior.
Boehly will have to make a decision over Abraham next summer one way or the other, especially as plenty of other clubs, including Premier League rivals Arsenal, have shown interest in the striker. And that is also the case for the other homegrown star Chelsea can bring back to Stamford Bridge: Livramento.
The Blues never wanted to lose their 2020/21 Academy Player of the Year, but the reality is they never did enough to convince him to stay. So when Southampton made an offer for the then 18-year-old – who had less than 12 months remaining on his contract – Granovskaia decided to sell.
She did, however, ensure Chelsea could re-sign Livramento in the summer of 2023 for the not insignificant fee of £38million. Again, that leaves Boehly and Eghbali with a decision to make.
What hasn't helped them is Livramento hasn't featured for Southampton since April after he suffered a knee ligament injury. And the right-back isn't expected to return until the start of next year. That doesn't leave the Chelsea ownership with a great deal of time in which to make a firm judgment as to whether he has fully recovered.
But there are two things to consider. The first is that prior to his injury, Livramento made the adaptation to Premier League football look easy. The 19-year-old impressed in his 28 top-flight appearances and Manchester United, Arsenal and Tottenham Hotspur had all been linked with approaches.
The second is Boehly, Eghbali and Feliciano have already shown faith in one young defender returning from a long-term injury: Wesley Fofana. The Blues spent £70million to sign the Frenchman from Leicester this summer despite the fact he only returned from a seven-month absence due to a broken leg in March.
Fofana was flown to New York to undergo tests by doctors from the LA Dodgers – partially owned by Boehly – before his signing was completed. That approach could be repeated if the new ownership group decides to bring Livramento back to the club to compete with Reece James, although he is also capable of playing on the opposite flank.
Re-signing both Abraham and Livramento would cost Chelsea £105million, a huge figure given the duo had come through the academy ranks at Cobham. However, Boehly has already highlighted his belief in the array of academy graduates plying their trade at the top level across Europe. He may see it as a worthwhile price to pay.
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