The forward joins the young Blues in impressive form, with six goals and five assists in 13 appearances for the Saints’ youth team across various competitions.

He returns to a Chelsea Academy he was part of at an earlier age group and qualifies for the Under-18s as well as the development squad.

Head of youth development and recruitment Jim Fraser said: ‘In signing Jimmy-Jay we have added a player with good potential to our Academy squads. His ability marks him out as an exciting striker and we are delighted he has chosen Chelsea for this next, important stage of his development.’

Highly rated prospect Jimmy-Jay Morgan got started in youth football at Cobham some ten years ago, before spending the last six years at Southampton’s academy. But now he’s back, having completed a move to Chelsea days after turning 17, and thus signing his initial three-year professional contract through 2026, having rejected a similar deal from Saints. (Three years is the maximum allowed for such deals.)

Morgan has become a prolific goalscorer for Southampton’s youth teams and we’re undoubtedly expecting him to do the same for us. He will initially join the U18s and the U21s, but it probably won’t be too long before he starts pushing for more challenging assignments.

According to reports, Chelsea are paying “an initial” £3m to make this happen, which might imply some conditional add-ons in the future but also indicates that they negotiated this deal rather than resorting to any sort of tribunal to decide the financial aspects (which probably would shortchange Southampton). The wheels were probably also greased by Joe Shields recently joining us from Southampton to become our new Co-Director of Recruitment and Talent.