Ranking all 20 of Chelsea's attackers: From star Cole Palmer to flop Mykhailo Mudryk and everything in-between

Chelsea's acquisition of forwards continues unabated. Since the takeover by the Clearlake Capital consortium in the summer of 2022 they have permanently signed 19 wingers, strikers and attacking midfielders. In the coming days that number should grow to a round 20, Borussia Dortmund's Jamie Gittens expected to follow Joao Pedro, who on Wednesday signed from Brighton and Hove Albion in a $69 million deal, arriving to feature in the closing stages of the Club World Cup.

All that spending adds up to in excess of half a billion dollars invested in the attack alone during the three years in which they have been led by Todd Boehly and Behdad Eghbali. And what is perhaps most notable about all that spending is that at least some of it has felt necessary. Debate the players Chelsea have alighted on as much as you wish but at the end of last season it was apparent that Enzo Maresca's side needed a left winger to replace Jadon Sancho, understandably sent back to Manchester United even at the cost of a penalty fee, and a second senior striker to either rival or supplant Nicolas Jackson. If Chelsea wanted to take the leap from Champions League qualifiers to title contenders, they might need further sprinklings of stardust.

And yet as will become apparent when we go through this long, long list, there is an awful lot else to consider beyond just whether the forwards currently at Maresca's disposal are going to win the biggest prizes. What is the market for Raheem Sterling, two years from the expiration of his $410,000 a week salary, his value tanked by a disappointing loan spell at Arsenal? Are Deivid Washington and David Datro Fofana the next iterations of the loan army of Roman Abramovich's time, destined to spend most of their 20s trawling the world on loan, their employers hoping they'll land at a club that can be tempted by a permanent move?

There is a great deal to sift through, plenty of grist for the ranking mill. How exactly we're separating these players is more art than science, reflecting their importance to the Chelsea cause but also the quality of performances they have delivered in recent seasons. You'll never guess who's No.1...

Not merely Chelsea's best player, Cole Palmer is a walking, hilariously talking exemplar for how the recruitment model should work at Stamford Bridge. Paul Winstanley and Laurence Stewart were not afraid to spend big in plucking Palmer from the fringes of the Manchester City squad for around $55 million, a fee they could comfortably double and perhaps even treble in the unlikely event they wanted to sell. At his peak early last season, he was the best attacker in the Premier League not named Mohamed Salah and even after a dip later in the campaign, he ended up in the division's top 10 for both assists and goals. From here on out, you could question whether Chelsea have a player who could be a star on a championship-winning team. Not with Palmer.

Nicolas Jackson may drive supporters crazy on his worst days but whether the ball goes in or not, he manages to do the one thing that every top striker manages: he gets his shots. Last season, he averaged 3.41 non-penalty efforts on goal per 90, the exact same number as Erling Haaland. A non-penalty xG of 0.55 is extremely impressive too, and what should be apparent from the shot chart below is how many of the shots he takes are good ones, his 0.163 xG per shot a fair way over the Premier League average. It is also worth noting the strength of Jackson's understanding with Cole Palmer,

There are question marks over both his composure in front of goal and his maturity, to which it might be worth noting he is still only 24. Given he is contracted until just after his 32nd birthday, there is time to iron out the kinks that separate him from a Victor Osimhen-level striker.

Since he arrived in England with Watford five years ago, Joao Pedro has consistently looked like a really interesting player. The raw ingredients are there and the Brazilian's ability to create shots for himself and his teammates and draw fouls from opponents speaks to a footballing brain that is ahead of his body's 23 years. Joao Pedro has been deployed right across the frontline, which might be a sign of his broad ability range or might be that he doesn't quite do enough anywhere. Take his goal output, 19 in the last two Premier League seasons, sounds nice, but nine of them have been penalties. Judge him as a striker and he does a lot of less striker-y things well: assisting, progressing, winning back possession. Compared to other wingers, well, he gets plenty of shots. A tweener forward is no bad thing to have in a squad, just perhaps not at $70 million.

It hasn't taken us long to get to the questionable players then...

Another who is hard to project out, Liam Delap looked great last season in an Ipswich side that never had much real hope of survival. In addition to his 12 goals, he brought a real work rate to the center forward position, and if you want to be generous, he averaged eight shots per 100 touches last season, more than anyone in the Chelsea squad bar Jackson. The raw attributes are there and he has fared well in the Club World Cup. But is he someone who could take the leap to starting No. 9 for a title contender?

The only one on this list who is not technically a Chelsea player yet, Gittens looks likely to seal a move from Borussia Dortmund after the Club World Cup is done. When he arrives, he will add a handy burst of speed to Maresca's frontline and a real ability to go out and fly beyond his defender. In the transition-heavy Bundesliga, Gittens looked devastating, but his eight goals did come from 3.6 xG. To really shine in his homeland, he is going to need to improve as both a creator and shot taker. At $76.1 million, this looks like a gamble but Gittens shoots well and can be eased into the side as a tertiary attacker in a 4-2-3-1. This could pay off nicely.

On quality alone, Madueke belongs in that third spot. The young winger looked like he was taking a leap last season, a tally of 11 goals and four assists perhaps not reflecting the consistency with which the 23-year-old got into prime positions. Averaging three and a half shots per 90 minutes is a great sign for a winger, all the better when he's not stat-padding with middling efforts from range. If Madueke continues on the trajectory he was on in 2024-25, he could be one of the best attackers in England before too long.

Curious then that he appears to be one Chelsea are prepared to move on so they can recruit elsewhere. Just about doubling their money should be the target, and if they do that, it is hard to argue that the signing has been anything other than an emphatic success. Then again, if you've brought a player to the cusp of being a really dangerous Premier League attacker, doesn't it make sense to see him hit those heights in your colors?

After blowing their rivals out of the water with a $70 million-plus deal, Chelsea got more than they could have reasonably expected from Pedro Neto in one crucial category: games played. The 44 matches he played in all competitions was more than in the previous two years with Wolves combined, but in the process,s it hinted that Neto's problem was not a lack of match rhythm. He just is not a player who delivers end product as often as he ought to, his six goals coming from just 3.8 xG. A combined 0.33 expected goals and expected assists per 90 Premier League minutes simply is not up to the standards Chelsea should have.

It is, of course impossible to know how the 18-year-old will fare when he makes his move from Brazil to England this summer, but at a very young age, he was bossing it in his homeland, 13 goals and nine assists in his age 16 campaign with Palmeiras. For now, it's hard to know how Estevao Willian will settle in London, but his impressive display against Porto in the Club World Cup augurs well for life across the Atlantic.

One of the most positive aspects of Chelsea's time in the Conference League was how it afforded senior game time for Tyrique George, who by the end of the season was translating his meaningful minutes with the shadow XI into a supersub role in the Premier League. It has been reported that the 19-year-old may depart on loan this summer, a shrewd move given that he looked ready for the run of games Maresca may be unable to afford him.

If the right offer comes in, it seems inevitable that Christopher Nkunku will depart Chelsea, last season proving to be an unhappy one for the one-time Bundesliga player of the season. Given the patchy transfer record under current ownership, it is tempting to look for flaws that could have been spotted when they signed the 27-year-old. In all likelihood, this was simply a case of Nkunku getting injured when he looked ready for a big season, and Palmer snatching his number 10 spot from him.

You simply cannot deny that Marc Guiu was too good for Shamrock Rovers, Astana and the rest of the field in the Conference League. What that means for his long-term role as a center forward at Chelsea probably will not become clear until he has spent a season or two out on loan. Still, as a $7 million pick up, there is relatively little downside risk for the Blues in the 19-year-old's development.

Palmeiras win battle of Brazilian clubs at Club World Cup, set up statement match with Europeans next

Another for whom only time will tell whether he can make an impact in the Chelsea side. Kendry Paez is expected to spend next season on loan at Strasbourg, a first step in European football for the attacking midfielder who holds the records for both the youngest debutant and scorer in Ecuador's top flight.

Some will argue that we've placed Carney Chukwuemeka in here to make for a nice round 20, to which we shall quote the great man himself, "I prefer not to speak." If I were to speak, I would say, look, the guy plays the same attacking midfield position as Palmer. He counts.

As for Chukwuemeka the player, the flashes we have seen of him in a Chelsea shirt suggest a prospect of real talent, one whose early career has been curtailed by injuries. The Blues would prefer to sell the former Aston Villa player but may have to settle for another year of loaning him out, with Borussia Dortmund said to be more ready to bring him back to Germany on a temporary basis than pay Chelsea's demands.

Armando Broja has been a member of that union for some time now, not helped by faintly ludicrous valuations like the supposed $68.5 million Chelsea wanted for him in January 2024. In 331 Premier League minutes on loan at Everton last season, Broja took just four shots. It's hard to see the Blues getting much of a price for him this summer.

There's a case to be made for not considering Kellyman on this list, given a hamstring injury robbed him of the chance to either go on loan, feature in the Conference League or perhaps gain minutes in the youth setup last season. Then again, Chelsea did spend $26 million on him last summer. That's first team money, even if it's not yet clear if they acquired a player who could impact on their first team.

When Chelsea snared Fofana, it looked like their talent scouts had spotted a star in Norway, but three loan spells have now passed by without much of note, the second half of last season spent nursing a knee injury. The club will do well to find a long-term taker for Fofana.

Let's check in on how it is going for Deivid Washington, given a chance to build some form in his homeland with Santos...

Not great, is it?

It is not that these next three are inferior talents to those above them nor even that it is utterly impossible to imagine these players building a career for themselves at Chelsea. It's not far off it though, particularly in Sterling's case.

Maybe a Premier League club gets tempted to take a swing at Sterling, gambling that the problem at Arsenal wasn't that his legs had gone but that he wasn't getting enough minutes to build sharpness. You could imagine him in Crystal Palace red and blue or Fulham white if he were prepared to take a pay cut to his sizeable wages next season. Then again, the problem in north London really did look like Sterling's legs had gone, that he had hit the real downslope on an age curve that looked to be bending away from him even before he arrived at Chelsea.

Of all the triumvirate laid out here, Joao Felix's presence on the roster is the most baffling. This club had a long hard look at him in the second half of the 2022-23 season, where a generous assessment might be that he looked a talent but not one you would be wise committing long-term money on.

Chelsea did exactly that 10 months ago in what looked to be a bookkeeping wheeze that would allow them to sell the eminently useful Conor Gallagher. Now they're on the hook for another six years of Felix unless they can find a buyer. Maybe a Saudi Arabian club saves them and maybe that's an appealing option for Felix too. If not that, it is hard to see what easy options are open to Chelsea beyond an endless conveyor belt of subsidised loans.

It might not be for deals Chelsea would like, but there is at least the prospect of them being able to move Sterling and Felix on. At the time of writing, it is hard to see how that happens with Mykhailo Mudryk, facing a ban of up to four years over a failed drugs test. It is worth noting that if he were handed the maximum ban from the date of his provisional suspension, he would still have two and a half years left on his Chelsea contract when he was free to play the game again (although of course there would be questions to be asked over whether his contract might be terminated by the club for gross misconduct).

Banned or not, it is not as if Mudryk has been a particularly impressive presence since Chelsea committed up to $118 million on him. The Ukrainian almost immediately looked like a player who struggled to put his pace to good use, delivering only 10 goals and 11 assists in 73 games.