Chelsea offers Raheem Sterling to Premier League rival as transfer stance made crystal clear

Chelsea has offered Raheem Sterling to Aston Villa after Enzo Maresca made clear the England winger is not wanted at Stamford Bridge. The $62.1 million signing is among the 15 Blues players up for sale and banished to train away from the first team.

Sterling wants to stay in the Premier League - he has been offered to Unai Emery's men, who can offer Champions League football - and his desire to win back his England place rules out a move to Saudi Arabia. Juventus were interested in a player swap deal, involving Federico Chiesa, which would not suit Chelsea.

Sterling wanted “clarity” from the club after he was left out of the squad to face Manchester City in the Premier League opener. The former Liverpool winger is the highest earner at Stamford Bridge on £300,000-a-week while the average wage on longer, incentivised contracts is now only £60,000. And the five-time Premier League players need to sell players to balance the books.

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But on the day Chelsea completed the £45.5m signing of Joao Felix, the Italian head coach claimed Sterling was being sold for footballing reasons.

"I'm not saying Raheem is not a good player but I prefer different kinds of wingers,” he said. “This is the reason why. I spoke with Raheem, one-on-one the day before City and I explained to him exactly the situation.

"I didn't see Raheem after the game. In this moment, they (Sterling and Ben Chilwell) are training apart. The situation with them both is quite clear. There is not any update on their situations."

In case I sit with Raheem, I will tell him exactly the same things that I already told him. I don’t have anything new to tell him because I was quite clear.”

The Stamford Bridge club is now in a race against time to offload players before the August 31 transfer deadline - or risk needing to keep paying and playing the unwanted players.

"We'll see,” added the Italian. “Now it is a bit early. We still have 10 days of the transfer window. As I said many times, many things can happen in the last 10 days, the last week, so we'll see."