Chelsea fans are excited. The swift signings of Hakim Ziyech and Timo Werner either side of the pandemic shutdown provided an early signal of Roman Abramovich’s ambition to build another Premier League and Champions League contender, and now the stars appear to be aligning for them to make a serious run at Bayer Leverkusen sensation Kai Havertz.
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Over the past two Bundesliga seasons, Havertz has established himself, alongside Jadon Sancho, as one of the most coveted young footballers in the world, to the point that in any ordinary summer transfer window he would have his pick of elite European clubs. Only the financial uncertainty caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, and Abramovich’s unwavering willingness to spend, have given Chelsea a unique chance to move to the front of a very long queue.
But why exactly is Havertz so desirable, and what specifically would he bring to Chelsea if they manage to acquire him?
Here, The Athletic takes a closer look at what makes him special.
Havertz first came to wider prominence in the 2018-19 season, scoring 17 goals in 34 league appearances as a 19-year-old – the most prolific campaign by a teenager in Bundesliga history. Even accounting for three converted penalties, his tally of 14 goals from open play was remarkably impressive considering his youth, and the fact he didn’t even play up front for Leverkusen.
Until his sacking in December 2018, Heiko Herrlich almost always deployed Havertz in the attacking midfield line, most often as the nominal No 10 in a 4-2-3-1. Unlike most conventional No 10s, however, he didn’t shoulder the creative burden in the team; that job belonged primarily to his good friend and Germany team-mate Julian Brandt, who regularly started on the left.
In fact, Havertz ranked just seventh among Leverkusen’s regular contributors for key passes per 90 minutes (1.1) in 2018-19 — fewer than defender Cesar Azpilicueta (1.2) is registering for Chelsea this season. His role in the team was not to be a creator of chances, but a finisher. He averaged 2.7 shot attempts per 90 minutes, only slightly fewer than striker Kevin Volland (2.8).
That role was maintained by Peter Bosz when he replaced Herrlich as coach, even as the Dutchman changed the team’s broader system to a variation of 3-4-2-1. Havertz was shifted slightly to the right, where he could cut in on his stronger left foot, but the emphasis remained on looking to threaten the opposition goal himself whenever he could.
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Many of Havertz’s 14 goals from open play were the result of immaculately timed runs into the penalty area from midfield positions, using his preternatural instincts for finding space and arriving at the perfect time to meet crosses from Brandt, Karim Bellarabi and Leon Bailey. Once there, his finishing was often clinical; he converted 19.5 per cent of his 87 shot attempts, and 40 per cent of his shots were on target.
He developed a particularly devastating chemistry with Brandt. Here he is in a Bundesliga match away at Mainz in February 2019, calling for the ball some 40 yards from goal because he knows his team-mate will delay the cross until he reaches a shooting position in the penalty area…
Brandt obliges, cutting the ball back from the left at the perfect moment. Havertz, barely breaking stride, coolly whips a first-time shot in at Florian Muller’s near post with his in-step…
This example, from the second minute of a match against Eintracht Frankfurt, shows Havertz’s starting position. Brandt is about to clip the ball into the left channel for Charles Aranguiz to advance into a crossing position. The moment the first pass is played, Havertz takes his cue to dart towards the edge of the penalty area…
Aranguiz’s excellent first-time cross picks out Havertz at the edge of the box, and he needs only one touch to set himself before clipping a surgically-precise finish just inside Kevin Trapp’s far post…
Here, early in a home match against Fortuna Dusseldorf, Volland is sizing up his options on the right flank. Havertz, having spotted space between the right-back and centre-back in the penalty area, casually jogs into it…
Volland’s in-swinging cross is good, and an unmarked Havertz only needs to stretch slightly to put the ball past a helpless Jaroslav Drobny…
It’s easy to see why Havertz has been hailed by some in Germany as the new Michael Ballack, another midfielder (and a former Chelsea one at that) with the rare gift of arriving in the opposition penalty area in the right time and place to score. The best comparison from a Chelsea perspective would be their current head coach Frank Lampard, whose devotion to these types of runs made him the greatest goalscoring midfielder of his generation.
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But it’s also worth pointing out that neither Ballack nor Lampard managed this level of scoring production when they were teenagers. Havertz is also faster across the ground than they were in their primes; his top speed of 35.02 km/h during a match against Bayern Munich was the fastest clocked by any Bundesliga midfielder last season.
This combination of speed and spatial intelligence makes Havertz a nightmare to deal with in transition situations. Here is the move that results in his first senior international goal, in a 2-2 friendly draw with Argentina in October 2019. The moment Lukas Klostermann wins the ball back just inside his own half on the right-hand side, Havertz, Brandt and Serge Gnabry start running…
Klostermann slides the ball outside to Gnabry and continues his run. It is Havertz, however, who has found the clearer path to goal – a fact he points out as he approaches the penalty area…
Gnabry plays the right pass on time and on target, giving Havertz a simple finish…
Havertz finished the 2018-19 season with three assists. His expected assists per 90 minutes rating of 0.09 was more akin to a striker than an attacking midfielder, but there were signs of a more creative player in the numbers; his 3.4 shot-creating actions per 90 minutes ranked 20th in the Bundesliga.
Europe’s top clubs had woken up to the promise of Havertz the goalscorer, but 2019-20 was about to introduce them to the full range of his talents.
Brandt’s departure to Borussia Dortmund last summer forced Leverkusen to change. Even with the arrivals of Kerem Demirbay and Nadiem Amiri from Hoffenheim, it meant Havertz would need to be more of a creator in order for the team to succeed while trying to find ways to maintain his own production in front of goal.
The transition was far from seamless. Havertz registered just three goals and one assist from August until the turn of the year, and his performances drew fierce criticism from those among the club’s support who believed he had allowed persistent links with many of Europe’s top clubs to derail his focus.
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Things began to turn with a clever dinked finish away in a 4-1 win away at Paderborn in mid-January, followed by the opening goal in a 3-0 home win over Fortuna Dusseldorf that showcased Havertz combining his intelligent movement in the final third with another weapon in his attacking arsenal: his aerial ability. Here, he darts towards the near post to meet an in-swinging Bellarabi cross…
…and meets it with the kind of header that would make any striker proud.
February saw Havertz’s creative instincts come to the fore. Here, in a home match against Augsburg, he appears to have run into trouble as he tries to lead a break – but he senses space to his right…
He turns into it, away from pressure, and advances before playing a pinpoint diagonal pass, with his supposedly weaker right foot, for Moussa Diaby, who opens the scoring…
In the next match, away at Porto in the Europa League’s last 32, he works himself into a very promising shooting position in space just outside the penalty area. But instead of taking it, he fakes the shot and slides the ball to an unmarked Lucas Alario, who promptly breaks the deadlock in what becomes a 3-1 win for Leverkusen…
The following month, injuries to Volland and Alario prompted Bosz to shift Havertz into the false nine role that looks like it could be the next stage in his evolution as a star.
His 10 appearances leading Leverkusen’s attack across all competitions before the DFB Pokal final against Bayern last Saturday yielded eight goals and two assists. Among them were trademark late arrivals into the box, such as this one against Cologne in June.
Havertz drops deep into his own half and sprays the ball out to Wendell on the left before starting his forward run…
…by the time Wendell has played Bailey into a crossing position, Havertz is unmarked precisely where he wants to be…
…and when the ball is cut back to him just past the penalty spot, there is no danger of the 50-yard dash affecting his ability to find the right finish.
There was also another header, this time when he spotted space at the back post midway through the first half against Werder Bremen…
…Diaby’s cross floats all the way over and Havertz rises to guide the header back across goal. He gets clattered from behind as he jumps and falls awkwardly, but it doesn’t stop him scoring.
Havertz’s winner away at Freiburg in May showcased his ability to play with his back to goal. Here, he receives a pass from Aranguiz and immediately flicks it around the corner to Bailey…
…he then arcs his run around and past his team-mate, giving him an overlapping option as he enters the penalty area…
…having received the pass, he somehow manages to poke a low shot into the far corner from a tight angle while under severe pressure from two defenders.
Havertz finished the pandemic-interrupted Bundesliga season with 12 goals and six assists in 30 appearances. He might easily have matched his 2018-19 scoring tally if he had been deployed as a false nine earlier in the campaign, or if he had not hit the woodwork more times (five) than anyone else in the division.
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His shot attempts dipped from 2.8 per 90 minutes to 2.2, but his efficiency in front of goal improved — converting 20.3 per cent of his overall shots and 46.2 per cent of his shots on target. Six assists is a relatively modest total, but doesn’t tell the whole story. Havertz more than doubled his key passes per 90 minutes from 1.1 to 2.3, while his shot-creating actions per 90 minutes rose from 3.4 to 4.3, seventh-best in the Bundesliga.
There is a strong statistical case for saying Havertz’s creative talents were undersold by the wastefulness of his team-mates; his expected assists rating for the season was 8.28 and despite all of his advanced creative numbers improving significantly in 2019-20, his average of 0.5 goal-creating actions per 90 minutes has remained stagnant over the past two years.
Havertz expanded his game significantly in this latest season, and the overall impression now is of a 21-year-old who is already operating at an elite level as both a scorer and a shot creator.
If the DFB Pokal final proves to be Havertz’s farewell appearance for Leverkusen, it wasn’t the triumphant swansong he would have hoped for – even if his last-minute penalty will go down as one of the finest angry consolation goals in recent memory.
Bayern played up to their reputation as arguably the world’s best team and largely stifled Havertz, whose natural inclination to drift over to the right flank gave him the unenviable task of facing Alphonso Davies. What is anyone supposed to do here – cut infield towards David Alaba, Joshua Kimmich and a world of pressure, or try to beat possibly the world’s fastest footballer in a race down the line?
Havertz did have his moments, though.
Here, with the score still 0-0, he gets himself into a great position in front of Alaba to meet Bailey’s low drilled cross from the left, but fails to connect.
And here he smartly draws Alaba across to the right with him, creating space for Bailey to try to send Amiri running through on goal. Sadly for Leverkusen, the defensive cheat code that is Davies made up the ground in the blink of an eye and snuffed out the danger.
This was Havertz’s best moment of the night, executed while seemingly trapped between Kimmich and the touchline, with Kingsley Coman rushing to cut off another escape route…
…a smart Cruyff turn leaves Kimmich in his wake, enabling Havertz to slip in Diaby, who supplies a low cross that Bailey blazes over.
The only time Havertz manages to get a running start on Davies, Leverkusen’s cause is already lost at 3-0 down with over an hour gone…
…his cross looks destined for Bailey, but Jerome Boateng stretches every sinew with a desperate lunge that clears the ball out for a corner.
Leverkusen had to do a lot of defending, and Havertz’s height came in useful defending set-pieces. Here he is, rising highest to head clear a Kimmich corner at the front of the six-yard box despite an attempt by Benjamin Pavard to get there first – the kind of timing and aggression Lampard has been desperately hoping to see from his Chelsea players all season when defending corners.
Havertz wouldn’t be a totally clean fit at Stamford Bridge.
His desire to drift to the right might well jar with Ziyech, who does the majority of his attacking damage from similar areas. If deployed as an attacking midfielder, his inclusion could come at the expense of Mason Mount’s development or Ruben Loftus-Cheek’s comeback, and up front he would compete with Tammy Abraham and Werner.
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But there is a compelling body of evidence to suggest this is a rare, potentially generational attacking talent – the type you don’t agonise about the ripple effects of signing.
Most of Europe’s top clubs have concluded they would love the opportunity to build their teams around Havertz for the next decade. If the opportunity is there, Chelsea should take it and worry about the rest later.
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