Chelsea have had eight of their young players return from their pre-season tour of Ireland early, according to a report by Sky Sports.
Lewis Baker, Izzy Brown, Lucas Piazon, Trevor Chalobah, Dujon Sterling, Ike Ugbo, Conor Gallagher and Marc Guehi have all left the squad and have returned to Cobham to “continue their preparations for the new season” with loan deals thought to be in the pipeline.
All eight players played some part in Chelsea’s 1-1 draw with Bohemians in Frank Lampard’s first game as manager.
Christian Pulisic and Willian will join up with the squad after Sunday’s match against St Patrick’s Athletic in Dublin after reaching the finals of the Gold Cup and Copa America respectively.
Chelsea’s decision to send back the eight aforementioned players should not really come as a surprise as they were all unlikely to have an opportunity to make an impact in Lampard’s first-team in the upcoming campaign.
Of the eight, six of them had spent time out on loan last season, with Gallagher and Guehi playing in the club’s Under-23 side.
Baker has played just once for Chelsea’s first-team (a three-minute cameo in a 2013/14 FA Cup tie), Piazon has only managed three appearances in his seven years at Stamford Bridge (all coming in the 2012/13 campaign), whilst Brown has also only made one solitary appearance for the Blues’ first-team (11 minutes in a Premier League match back in 2015).
Everybody else is yet to have clocked any minutes, although Gallagher was named as a substitute in the Europa League final last season.
Arguably, senior players like Kurt Zouma, Mason Mount, Fikayo Tomori and Tammy Abraham would be expected to get opportunities ahead of the eight mentioned, after all of them excelled whilst out on loan last season.
Chelsea fans, who do you think has the best chance of being in Lampard’s squad next season? Let us know your thoughts below by sharing them in the comments section!
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