Chelsea have dropped a major hint surrounding their interest in Shakhtar Donetsk winger Mykhailo Mudryk.
Blues chiefs travelled to Poland to conduct discussions with the Ukrainian club on Saturday regarding signing the 22-year-old, and it appears that a deal between the two teams is now close.
Shakhtar's official English language Twitter account announced the negotiations in a tweet.
'FC Shakhtar president Rinat Akhmetov and Chelsea co-owner Behdad Eghbali discussed Mykhailo Mudryk’s transfer to Chelsea FC today. Parties are very close to agree on player’s transfer to the club.'
Chelsea's account then quote tweeted the aforementioned post, adding an eyes emoji seemingly confirming that a deal to sign the winger is soon to be revealed.
The news comes just days after it appeared that the player would instead be heading to North London after Arsenal tabled a third bid that could reach £80million for the player.
Mikel Arteta's side were said to be Mudryk's preferred destination, and the Spaniard sent Gunners fans into a frenzy online after he seemingly confirmed that a deal to land his top target for the January window was close during a press conference earlier this week.
Speaking after Monday night's FA Cup victory over Oxford United, Arteta reaffirmed his desire to bring in attacking reinforcements with summer signing Gabriel Jesus still unavailable after suffering an injury on international duty at the World Cup.
‘The problem is that we have only one striker and to cope for that many months until Gabby is back is not easy,' he said.
'But we have to get the most out of the players that we have at the moment. If we can have some reinforcements, great.'