Chelsea defender Trevoh Chalobah to leave in January
Chelsea’s ongoing transition from top down continues to create a ripple effect across all stakeholders in the club.
With the Blues unable to appoint Christoph Freund as their sporting director, Graham Potter yet to test his team’s mettle in matches and Damian Willoughby’s recent sacking as the team’s commercial director, it’s fair to say nothing is set in stone at present.
In the midst of this unrest, football transfer expert Fabrizio Romano has claimed academy graduate Trevoh Chalobah wants to leave the club as early as the winter transfer window.
The 23-year-old made his breakthrough with a swashbuckling performance in the UEFA Super Cup final against Villarreal as they won 6-5 on penalties.
Only three days later, he’d sink on the floor with his arms aloft and then on to his face, hiding the emotions that stirred up following years of sacrifice and the sole aim of representing his boyhood side. He had scored a stunner in the Blues’ opening day 3-0 win over Crystal Palace.
Chalobah took his senior Chelsea career by storm, amassing 30 appearances in all competitions. He was rewarded with a new contract that would keep him with the club until 2026.
Fast forward to this summer, as Chelsea forked out £165.5 million to shore up their defense, Chalobah has only registered one appearance so far in the Premier League. That was a full 90 minutes in the 2-1 victory over bottom-dwellers Leicester City.
It began last season, as Chalobah had to watch from the sidelines in seven out of the final 10 match days in the division. Tuchel, of all the things he had done right, was giving the youngster a Frank Lampard-Fikayo Tomori treatment, clouded by a lack of communication.
As per Romano, Chalobah wanted to go out on loan this summer for obvious needs. Chelsea blocked the move, and it appears Inter Milan, AC Milan and RB Leipzig will be back on the radar in January.
“He wants to be an important player, not just a starter, at the moment there is no space. From what I am told, there are conversations already. Nothing is decided, we will see but there is a serious possibility for Chalobah to leave if the situation doesn’t change,” said Romano.
He’s got all the capabilities to be a top player for Chelsea, there’s no doubt about that. But for a club that has failed to take care of their own in recent years, will it be another case of losing a gifted Cobham player? Over the last three seasons, Chelsea have already sold Marc Guehi, Tariq Lamptey and Fikayo Tomori. And if things don’t improve over the coming weeks, Chalobah could soon be adding his name to that list as well.
-Roy Akarshak
Twitter: @RoyAkarshak
Photo: Ncadc2004. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.