Just as the long and winding Tiemoue Bakayoko summer transfer saga seemed to be finishing up, it took yet another turn. Bakayoko, a midfielder with Monaco, was at Chelsea’s Cobham training ground today to undergo his medical and finalize his approximately £40 million move.
Friday afternoon even saw the Frenchman post a photo of himself at the training complex on Instagram. During this entire process this summer, Bakayoko has been using social media to indicate his movements, but not all of his postings are to be fully trusted.
He has since deleted the Chelsea training ground snap, and later posted two Tweets Friday night that indicate his Chelsea move is now off, with a return to Monaco in the cards. The first one indicated that he was at London’s Heathrow Airport, with emojis of stop signs, airplanes and the flags representing the principality of Monaco.
The second Twitter posting expressed his sentiment that he missed Monaco, and was flying home.
https://twitter.com/TimoeB08/status/885970843779694592
https://twitter.com/TimoeB08/status/885979055748677632
Rumors have been flying that the 24-year-old failed his medical and that the deal is now off. It’s a move that’s been protracted enough already as Chelsea have reportedly been concerned about the health of his knee. It could be that he’s just messing with all of us, perhaps he is “trolling,” depending on what your definition of that word is.
It’s certainly not something that’s beneath Bakayoko as just yesterday morning he geo-tagged one of his Tweets to Manchester, trying to convey the fact he was there instead of in London. It’s an obvious allusion to the transfer rumors linking him to Manchester United, but the joke doesn’t work because the team is already in Los Angeles and new additions to the club would head to L.A. not Manchester.
If his move to Chelsea is still on, then all of this trolling is extremely childish, and quite frankly a character red flag that both Chelsea and Monaco would then have to be concerned about.
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net and TheBank.News, partnered with FOX Sports Engage Network and News Now. Banks, a former writer for the Washington Times, NBC Chicago.com and Chicago Tribune.com, currently contributes regularly to WGN CLTV.
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