Chelsea were one of several clubs watching Benfica on Thursday night as the Portuguese side beat Juventus in the Europa League. Jose Mourinho's scouts were joined by representatives from Manchester United, Manchester City, WBA, Barcelona, Celtic, Wolfsburg, Montpellier and several Portuguese teams. The Italian national team also had someone present to keep an eye on Juve's World Cup hopefuls.
It's almost certain that Chelsea's target was a Benfica player, they've watched the club's matches closely lately and a match against Juventus was a perfect opportunity to see players tested perhaps more than they usually are.
Liverpool are a club who have watched Benfica recently too and their presence in March and early April led to rumours of them buying half the Benfica team, but most notably Lazar Markovic. That sounded like a red herring to pressure Chelsea into completing a reported deal they have for the young Serbian early.
In December O Jogo said that Chelsea had an agreement which would see Markovic arrive at Stamford Bridge in the summer of 2015 for €15m.
Rather than Liverpool, the pressure to bring him earlier could be coming from his performances. Markovic is getting better and better at Benfica and Chelsea could be tempted to try and get the 20 year old earlier.
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