Chelsea’s Champions League ambitions are still in their own hands.
On Friday night, in a game that lacked quality for long periods, the Blues battled to a 1-0 victory over Manchester United at Stamford Bridge, with Marc Cucurella the night’s only scorer, heading home a Reece James cross at the back post.
This goal prevented Enzo Maresca’s team from slipping out of the top five, and victory over Nottingham Forest at the City Ground on the final day will secure Champions League qualification, although anything less would almost certainly see them miss out.
With the Conference League final in Wrocław to come, followed by the Club World Cup stateside, it’s set to be a busy summer on the pitch for the Blues, while, off it, you can better your bottom dollar that they’ll be active in the transfer market, with a new striker top of their list of priorities.
The latest on Nicolas Jackson's future
One man not involved in the victory over Man United was Nicolas Jackson, commencing his three-match suspension, having been sent off, following video review, for colliding with Sven Botman’s face last Sunday.
The Senegalese striker will also be banned for next weekend’s trip to Nottingham, as well as the opening day of next season in August, but where will he find himself in the pecking order by then?
Well, Maresca certainly views Jackson as an important figure, praising his out-of-possession work rate, and he has certainly been a key figure this season, scoring 12 goals in 33 appearances across all competitions, with nine of his ten in the Premier League coming before Christmas, which Ed Dove of ESPN described as the ‘finest goal-scoring run of his Chelsea career’.
So let’s assess Jackson’s Premier League statistics this season, and how they compare to the rest of the division.
Minutes
2,220
129th
Goals
10
19th
Goals per 90
0.41
28th
Shots
76
15th
Shots on target
34
9th
Shots on target%
44.7%
28th
Goals per shot
0.13
65th
Goals – xG
-2.3
555th
Big chances missed
19
4th
The table underlines that Jackson is certainly not a clinical finisher, with only 13 players, out of 569, registering a lower goals – xG figure in the Premier League this season, while only three players have missed more Opta-defined big chances.
In summary, Jackson takes a lot of shots but not a lot of them are goals, so, if Chelsea are going to be competing to win the biggest trophies again, they probably need a better centre-forward, so could one be available?
Chelsea could land Nicolas Jackson upgrade
According to a recent report by Jörg Weiler and Yannick Hüber of Bild, Chelsea have been given the opportunity to sign Borussia Dortmund striker Serhou Guirassy, claiming that he has a €70m (around £59m) release clause in his contract.
They added that Arsenal, Liverpool, Manchester United, Manchester City, Paris Saint-Germain, Barcelona, and Real Madrid are also interested, even if die Schwarzgelben’s sporting director Lars Ricken is insistent the striker will not move this summer.
So why are so many of Europe’s top clubs interested in Guirassy’s services?
Well, after scoring 30 goals for Stuttgart last season, he joined Dortmund for a reported fee of £14.7m in the summer, netting 33 times across all competitions during this campaign, including 13 in the Champions League, making him the joint-top scorer in the tournament, alongside Raphinha.
His Bundesliga statistics across the last two seasons are pretty impressive too.
Harry Kane
36
25
61
Serhou Guirassy
28
20
48
Loïs Openda
24
9
33
Ermedin Demirović
15
14
29
Tim Kleindienst
12
16
28
Benjamin Šeško
14
13
27
Omar Marmoush*
12
15
27
*joined Manchester City in January 2025.
As the table shows, only Harry Kane has scored more Bundesliga goals than Guirassy this season and last, the Guinean doing so in a largely dysfunctional Dortmund team this season, making his exploits all the more impressive.
As a result, Andrews Sefa of 3Sports labels him “clinical”, while Abdullah Mamaniyat of Breaking the Lines praises his ‘great movement’ and his ‘ability to create goals out of nothing’.
So, the big question remains: how does he compare to Jackson?
Well, let’s find out.
Appearances
77
74
Minutes
5,891
6,101
Goals
29
63
Assists
11
12
Goals – xG
-6
+6
Shots
179
221
Shots on target %
45.8%
44.8%
Shot-creating actions
166
171
Goal-creating actions
22
32
Touches per 90
26
35
As the table outlines, Guirassy comes out on top for almost every single metric included, with his goals – xG figure of +6 in stark contrast to the -6 posted by Jackson, which speaks to the gulf in quality between the two centre-forwards.
Ryan Benson of Opta’s the Analyst labels Guirassy ‘the complete striker’, an assertion all available statistics support, so it is clear that he would be a massive upgrade on Jackson, and his potential arrival, for just £59m, could take Chelsea to the next level with his clinical finishing in front of goal.
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1 ByAngus Sinclair May 17, 2025