A sudden change in coach has opened up new doors for Chelsea players despite being away from the club this season...CONTINUE READING
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A penny for Billy Gilmour’s thoughts right now. The 21-year-old midfielder was sold on deadline day to Brighton with Graham Potter still in charge.
There was a general feeling that for the Scotland international, the environment would prove beneficial under a highly impressive coach who played a style of football that suited his game.
Only a week later, Potter had gone to Chelsea. How seismic a move that is generally for Chelsea has already been dissected, but for players like Gilmour, should they have remained, their prospects have potentially flipped.
It is believed Chelsea’s new owners were hesitant to sanction a permanent sale for Gilmour, but the player wanted out. Earlier in the window, another trio of youngsters were also in a similar boat, but Todd Boehly got his way.
Levi Colwill, Ethan Ampadu and Callum Hudson-Odoi all were sent out on loan for this season. Colwill to Brighton, Ampadu to Spezia and Hudson-Odoi to Leverkusen. In all three cases, the spectre of a permanent sale loomed.
In the case of Colwill, it was obviously linked to the pursuit of Marc Cucurella, in which, for a period, it looked like the 19-year-old would follow Fikayo Tomori and Marc Guehi as a promising defender sold prematurely. Chelsea paid more for Cucurella, but they kept Colwill.
Ampadu has felt like a player in limbo for some time, one whose path has veered from promising to uncertain — leaving for his first loan to Leipzig in the summer of 2019 when Frank Lampard was appointed before going out to Sheffield United and Venezia.
Although he featured in a couple of matchday squads under Thomas Tuchel, it was clear he was not in the German’s plans. A return to Serie A felt appropriate given his need for minutes before a likely World Cup place in the Wales squad.
Hudson-Odoi was another one who needed to leave for minutes. A need for rejuvenation and a fresh start. A clean cut from Chelsea would not have been shocking but proved a step again too far for the new owners to accept, given his clear potential that could still be reached at Stamford Bridge.
Before last Wednesday, all three might have been drifting towards a permanent exit in 2023, with Tuchel looking elsewhere in the future for solutions. Now with Potter, a coach promoted for his ability to improve players and develop youngsters, this strategy signals a greater intention to reintegrate these players eventually.
