Chelsea: What Can Ousmane Dembele Bring to Stamford Bridge?

The 25-year-old Frenchman is out of contract this summer and is being widely tipped to join Chelsea and reunite with Thomas Tuchel, a manager under whom he played arguably his best football.

Ousmane Dembele has endured a rather frustrating spell at Barcelona after his mega-money move from Dortmund in the club’s effort to replace Neymar. A string of injuries and fitness trouble combined with the occasional discipline issue has led to his career at the club failing to kick onto the heights expected.

While Barcelona are attempting to tie Dembele down to a new contract, it is believed that the electric winger is looking for a new challenge and is open to a move to Chelsea. For the Blues, new ownership is heralding its first summer transfer window and it’s thought that Todd Boehly will be backing Tuchel in the market for the targets that he wants, meaning this is a potential transfer that has legs.

Chelsea have a plethora of attacking talent but they’ve generally struggled to break down deep blocks and score the number of goals needed for a sustained title challenge.

So What Can Ousmane Dembele Bring to Chelsea That’s Different From Their Current Options?

Simply put, Dembele is a uniquely talented winger at creating quality chances. He’s ambipedal with very strong dribbling ability, making him a nightmare for defenders to handle.

Over the past 12-months, he’s been producing at an xA of 0.47 per 90 mins in La Liga, a rate close to TWICE as high as Chelsea’s best figure for an attacking player with Mason Mount at 0.25 per 90. He’s also managed at 0.66 assists per 90 or 2 assists every 3 full games, which is pretty remarkable.

His supreme dribbling ability makes him an excellent ball progressor in attacking areas – a key asset in building attacks that only Callum Hudson-Odoi has excelled at since the exit of their talismanic progressor-and-creator, Eden Hazard.

Hudson-Odoi has been hampered by a long-term injury and is slowly showing signs of returning to the pace and dribbling ability he possessed before it, but having a winger who’s done so at an elite level under this coach previously can only be a good thing for the London side.

Dembele manages 14.34 progressive carries per 90 and 4.04 dribbles completed per 90, placing him at the 99th percentile in both those categories for attacking midfielders/wingers in the past year.

It’s this elite ball-carrying ability and creativity that make Dembele a potent weapon for any side. There are, as one would expect, also some caveats. As mentioned before, Dembele has had a lot of fitness concerns and some disciplinary issues at Camp Nou.

While not necessarily a negative given the other facets to his game, he is unlikely to be a prominent goalscorer and generally has shown up at 0.06-0.10 xG/shot, suggesting he tends to shoot from positions that are less favourable to score from.

Available on a ‘free transfer’ – fully aware that no transfer in football is truly ‘free’ – if Tuchel believes he can again bring the best out of Dembele, Chelsea could have a fantastic player on their hands.