Red Bull Salzburg sporting director Christoph Freund has refused to rule out a possible move to Chelsea in the near future.
Since becoming sporting director in 2015, the 45-year-old has held a number of positions with the perennial Austrian champions and has overseen a continuous era of success.
Since Christoph Freund took over as manager, Salzburg have won seven Austrian Bundesliga titles in a row, as well as sanctioning money transfers of a number of famous players.
In recent years, Erling Braut Haaland, Dayot Upamecano, Dominik Szoboszlai, and Naby Keita have all come through the ranks before leaving for large payments, while Karim Adeyemi and Brenden Aaronson became Salzburg’s two most expensive transfers of all time in the recent summer window.
Salzburg also signed Lucas Gourna-Douath and Strahinja Pavlovic to their young squad, and the Austrian champions edged Chelsea to a 1-1 draw in Champions League action on Wednesday.
With the Blues looking for a new sporting director following Marina Granovskaia’s departure, Todd Boehly is said to have suggested Freund as a possible candidate.
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The Salzburg manager recently addressed the rumours to Sky Sports Austria, stating that he was enjoying life in Salzburg but did not rule out a move to Chelsea, who he referred to as a “huge club.”
“You should never rule anything out in football and Chelsea are such a huge club. But I’m sports director in Salzburg and I really enjoy it,” Christoph Freund said. “Chelsea is a huge club in transition. I can’t say exactly what will happen in the next few weeks and months.”
The 45-year-old also said that talks had taken place with the Blues about signing forward Benjamin Sesko, who has already scored 15 goals in 50 games for Salzburg at the age of 19.
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RB Leipzig, on the other hand, have won the race to sign the 6ft 5in Slovenia international, who will join the German giants in the summer of 2023.
“I’ve had exchanges with Chelsea from time to time. We spoke more often a month or two ago because they were interested in Sesko,” Christoph Freund continued.
“The new owners are interested in how we do it with young players, how we integrate them into the first team. But you do that again and again with other clubs – that’s it.”
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