He has a score to settle and a reputation to restore but Chelsea will simply be glad to have landed Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang.
At 33 his best years are undoubtedly behind him but if he retains even half that guile the grabbed goals for fun on the way to winning the FA Cup for Arsenal then he’ll be worth sticking in your fantasy Premier League team.
Barring an almighty U-turn the deal should be done within the next few days. Robert Lewandowski remains in front of Aubameyang at Barcelona while there is no one to trouble the Gabon goal poacher at Stamford Bridge. Anyone who has seen Chelsea play, either in pre-season or in these early Premier League weeks, will know just why they need a marksman of his ilk.
Right now they are toothless, squeezing square pegs into round holes and trying to convince themselves more than anyone else that they can make it work without a striker. Not this season. Manchester City smashed 99 top-flight goals last season. And that was before the arrival of Erling Haaland. Liverpool scored only five fewer before they brought in Darwin Nunez this summer.
Chelsea were the third highest scorers of the 2021/22 campaign but won nothing and are unlikely to win to settle for Bronze yet again while Spurs have Golden Boot winners Harry Kane and Son Heung Min leading the line for them. Arsenal have Gabriel Jesus who has started the season like a house on fire and you suspect neither north London club will be as far behind the Blues as they were last season in terms of goals. So Aubameyang’s arrival cannot come soon enough for Chelsea.
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There will be few concerns about his productivity under Thomas Tuchel. In five years at Dortmund, Aubameyang smashed 98 goals in 127 league starts. And in his short time at Barcelona - he signed for free in February after Arsenal terminated his contract - he netted 11 times in 13 League starts. In a dressing room packed with Champions League winners at Chelsea, you get the sense Aubameyang will not get away with - or even try - the kind of antics that saw him stripped of the captaincy so publicly at Arsenal.
The All Or Nothing documentary laid bare the extent to which his relationship with Mikel Arteta disintegrated - to the point where the Spaniard kept a dossier on his footballing crimes and misdemeanours. Aubameyang’s focus at Barcelona suggests he has learned from the experience. But that doesn’t mean to say that he won’t be scanning the fixture list to find out when he will get the chance to face Arteta again.
The striker won’t admit it, of course. He’ll play it down and dismiss suggestions that he has a point to prove to the man who made the world aware that Arsenal no longer wanted him. But all eyes will be on Stamford Bridge on November 5 and the Emirates on April 29. Friends Reunited, parts 1 and 2 will be fascinating.
