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Report: Chelsea willing to pay club-record fee to sign Dortmund's Haaland

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Chelsea are prepared to spend over €80 million to sign Borussia Dortmund phenom Erling Haaland this summer, The Athletic's Simon Johnson reports.

The Blues reportedly have no issues paying a club-record fee to convince Dortmund to sell Haaland a year before his €75-million release clause becomes active.

That would require an investment surpassing the initial €80 million Chelsea spent to acquire playmaker Kai Havertz from Bayer Leverkusen last summer.

Haaland - who's scored an incredible 35 goals in 35 matches since joining Dortmund from Red Bull Salzburg in January 2020 - would prefer a move to Real Madrid, according to Johnson. But a pre-emptive bid from Chelsea could turn the situation in their favor.

The Premier League giants would also need to deal with Mino Raiola, who represents Haaland and usually commands millions of euros in commission. Chelsea lost out on the signing of Romelu Lukaku in 2017 after refusing to meet Raiola's demands. Lukaku subsequently joined Manchester United and has since dropped Raiola as his agent.

This time, things could be different. Chelsea reportedly view Haaland as a game-changer who can take the club back to the top of European football. Despite rostering a promising group of center-forwards, including Timo Werner and Tammy Abraham, the club appears more than willing to pull out all the stops to land the Norwegian star.

Olivier Giroud, whose contract expires at the end of the campaign, is expected to leave Chelsea as a free agent.

Haaland has also been linked with moves to Manchester United and Manchester City.

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