Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho confirms Fabregas interest

Jose Mourinho has admitted Chelsea are interested in signing Cesc Fabregas from Barcelona as the midfielder’s Spain team-mate Gerard Pique let slip a £26.8million deal is already done.

The Chelsea manager said it was clear Fabregas wants to return to the Premier League, three years after leaving Arsenal, and revealed he is ‘monitoring the situation’ with a view to securing a deal after the World Cup.

On the Spanish midfielder, Mourinho said: ‘We have some (interest in Fabregas). I have interest in analysing the situation.

‘It looks like he’s really interested in leaving Barcelona, and is very interested in coming back to England. This is clear. But it’s not for now, or tomorrow, or for before the World Cup.

‘There is a process where he wants to leave, he wants to come to England because it’s the country where he wants to be and where he prefers to play. We are interested in monitoring the situation.’

Pique, however, believes the deal has already been done. The defender was caught on camera in Washington telling Spain coach Vicente del Bosque that Fabregas will leave for £26.8m this summer after Barcelona ended the season without winning any silverware.

The midfielder, 27, qualifies as a home-grown player in the Premier League after spending eight years at Arsenal and has expressed his interest in moving back to England after just three years in his native Catalonia, with two years left on his Barcelona contract.

Pique is overheard telling Del Bosque, albeit with a smile: ‘He (Fabregas) told me that it is already done. He is leaving already, 33 million euros he said.’

The defender had earlier told Spanish newspaper Mundo Deportivo: ‘Cesc has never been sufficiently evaluated in Barcelona. He is not valued as he deserves.

‘Cesc would work in any club in the world, but this club is very complicated.’