Chelsea celebrates: Satpaev even makes Lamine Yamal look "old"

Dastan Satpaev (left), just 16, is pictured here playing for the Kazakh national team. Picture alliance / ZUMAPRESS.com

At many professional clubs, it has now become common practice to hire a specific person to manage loaned players – and those who have already signed a pre-contract with the club. It's questionable whether a single person is even sufficient in the case of Chelsea FC. In any case, Dastan Satpaev's name should be on everyone's radar at the Blues.

At the beginning of the year, the eventual Conference League winners secured the services of the 16-year-old striker – reportedly for a transfer fee of four million euros. "In the summer of 2026, upon reaching the age of majority, he will officially join the English club," Satpaev's current club, Kairat Almaty, announced at the time.

Among other things, Chelsea officials were likely impressed by the fact that Satpaev had already made his professional debut for Kairat in May 2024 – at that time he was still 15 years old. A milestone that would be followed by many more.

For example, his debut as a substitute in the Kazakh Premier League, where he immediately scored his first professional goal in a 1-1 draw with FC Astana . Ultimately, it only took two league appearances for the first team to impress Kazakhstan national coach Ali Aliyev – and make history once again. The youngest Kazakh debutant has made three senior international appearances to date.

With so many records, it's naturally becoming increasingly difficult to set more. On Tuesday evening, it almost happened again, but at "already" 16 years, 10 months, and 26 days, the youngster's age proved to be his undoing for the first time—to put it very bluntly.

In the first leg of the first round of Champions League qualifying against Olimpija Ljubljana, Satpaev scored the opening goal for the visitors, who ultimately had to settle for a 1-1 draw . In the all-time list of youngest debut goalscorers in the history of the Champions League, he surpassed big names like Romelu Lukaku (17 years, 2 months, and 21 days) and current Barcelona prodigy Lamine Yamal (17 years, 2 months, and 6 days).

So it should be easy for the young goalscorer to accept that both Nicklas Bärkroth (16 years, 6 months and 4 days in the CL qualification ) and Wlodzimierz Lubanski (16 years, 8 months and 16 days in the European Cup ) were even younger when they scored their debut goals.