A young Marcin Bulka at Chelsea. (Getty)
Chelsea have started the season incredibly well despite their owner being blocked from entering the country, losing their starting goalkeeper, rumours surrounding the departure of their star man in Eden Hazard and the introduction of a new manager.
Under Maurizio Sarri, the Blues have played some superb football and at the moment sit top of the league after winning five games out of five. Along with the arrival of Sarri, Chelsea also added Jorginho, Mateo Kovacic and shattered the world record fee for a goalkeeper by signing Athletic Bilbao goalkeeper, Kepa Arrizabalaga for £71.6 million.
The club were held to ransom by Thibaut Courtois and were practically forced into selling the Belgium international. After a whole season of Courtois pushing for a move, Chelsea had to sell him for a cut-price fee and hurriedly brought in a replacement for a very inflated price. The Spaniard has had an easy start to the season but in truth, the Blues haven’t played many top teams aside from Arsenal.
However, over a long season, the 23-year-old is going to be tested at one point or another, and Chelsea will need suitable backups to replace him over the season. While many fans will point to Willy Caballero as the club’s sole replacement to the team, they also have another who can step in ahead of the Argentinian.
Under-23 ‘keeper, Marcin Bulka got his chance in the pre-season and put in some great performances especially against Arsenal. Signed to the Chelsea academy in September 2016 from Polish side Escola Varsovia, Bulka made his debut for the youth side against Arsenal and signed his first professional contract the same month.
Since then Bulka has established himself as a superb youth goalkeeper and should not only challenge Caballero for the backup role but even compete with Kepa. The tall Polish goalkeeper is incredibly agile and is a superb shot-stopper.
Kepa is the first-choice and will likely keep that role, after his superb performances during the pre-season, there’s no reason why Bulka can’t challenge for the backup spot and become one of the few youngsters to finally break into the first-team.
Chelsea fans…what do you think?
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