Cole Palmer shirt number confirmed after Chelsea complete £42.5m move and hint at next transfer

Cole Palmer will wear the number 20 shirt after completing his transfer to Chelsea. The 21-year-old has signed for the Blues in a £42.5million transfer and penned a seven-year deal with the club holding the option for a further year.

The Manchester City youth product will come into Mauricio Pochettino's first team as the Blues looked to complete their squad with a versatile forward before the transfer window closed. He is expected to be eligible to feature against Nottingham Forest on Saturday afternoon.

Upon signing, Palmer said: «I’m excited to get started and it feels great to sign.

»I’ve joined Chelsea because the project here sounds good and because of the platform I will have to try to showcase my talents. It is a young and hungry squad and, hopefully, we can do something special here."

Palmer takes the shirt from Andrey Santos who completed a season-long loan to Nottingham Forest earlier in August, while Denis Zakaria donned the number shirt for Chelsea last term after completing a transfer deadline day move of his own 12 months ago.

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Callum Hudson-Odoi was a more long term holder of the Chelsea shirt having worn the number from the 2018/19 season until he went on loan to Bayer Leverkusen last term. Having not been involved with the first team all summer, the Cobham product has yet to be handed a number this season.

Hudson-Odoi is believed to be close to a permanent transfer to Nottingham Forest on deadline day in a deal that could be worth £8million. Fulham were contenders to sign the 22-year-old but appear to have missed out on getting the Chelsea ace to remain in west London.