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Chelsea have moved closer to signing Maxence Lacroix after increasing their offer to around \u00a352m, according to reports.<\/strong><\/p>\n Crystal Palace are continuing to demand a higher fee for the France international, but the two clubs are now moving towards an agreement.<\/p>\n Palace are reportedly prepared to sell Lacroix once Chelsea reach an acceptable cash valuation.<\/p>\n According to\u00a0Alan Nixon\u2019s latest update, negotiations have advanced as Chelsea push to deliver another major signing for Xabi Alonso.<\/p>\n Both clubs are currently focused on agreeing the guaranteed cash package.<\/p>\n Possible player exchanges could be discussed later, but Chelsea are not using a swap to reduce the current Lacroix valuation.<\/p>\n That approach should simplify negotiations and prevent discussions over unwanted players from delaying the centre-back\u2019s move.<\/p>\n Read Chelsea reported earlier this week\u00a0that Palace were in a strong position because Lacroix remains under contract for another three years.<\/p>\n The latest development suggests Chelsea are now willing to move closer to Palace\u2019s demands rather than pursue another defensive target.<\/p>\n Lacroix would bring Premier League experience, recovery pace and physical strength to Alonso\u2019s back line. The 26-year-old can also defend the larger spaces created when Chelsea press higher up the pitch.<\/p>\n Personal terms could still require work. Chelsea reportedly need to offer Lacroix a significant pay increase because the Blues will not play European football during the 2026\/27 season.<\/p>\n No final agreement has been reached, but the gap between the clubs appears to be narrowing.<\/p>\n Chelsea must now decide whether to make one more increase and complete a deal before Alonso\u2019s squad travels overseas.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Chelsea have moved closer to signing Maxence Lacroix after increasing their offer to around \u00a352m,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":18808,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18807","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-chelsea"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18807","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18807"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18807\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/18808"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18807"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18807"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18807"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Chelsea keep possible swaps separate from Lacroix fee<\/h2>\n