England U21’s kicked off their European Championship with a stale draw against Sweden. Unfortunately for Chelsea, their youngsters showed very little promise in the display.
Chelsea players Nathaniel Chalobah, Lewis Baker and Tammy Abraham all started for the Three Lions. Each had something to prove to their club back home.
Disappointingly, the best one can say about all three players is that they played a full 90 minutes. Hopefully the Chelsea scouts and analysts were still on holiday. Although they weren’t bad, per se, they did nothing.
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Nathaniel Chalobah was very restricted to a defensive midfield positioning. He often had to cover both sides because Baker and James Ward-Prowse were nowhere to be seen. He was comfortable on the ball, though, and played some nice passes. Moving forward in the tournament he needs to look for longer passes to skip the opposition midfield, and he certainly needs to be driving forward aiming to get shots away.
Baker did absolutely nothing in the first half. I regularly forgot he actually started the game. It was difficult to tell whether his teammates were just bad at finding him, or whether he was bad at finding space. Most likely the former. He popped up a few times just outside the box in the second half but wasn’t threatening at all. He seemed frustrated, but can only improve from here.
Abraham had a solid game under the circumstances. He led the line on his own, and did it very well. Although he was thrown off the ball a couple of times, he used his strength and height well to bring the ball down and look to push the pace of the attack. Isolated for most of the game, he had one spectacular attempt go just over the bar.
Nathaniel Chalobah saw fleeting minutes with Chelsea during the title-winning campaign, mainly as a substitute and in the cup competitions. He has the best chance of this U21 trio to progress and lock down a possible starting position. Particularly with Nemanja Matic’s future up in the air, he has a prime opportunity to pounc. At 22 years old, he needs to be playing regularly.
Lewis Baker had a good season in his second year on loan at Vitesse, Chelsea’s trusted loan supplier. He is set to return to the Blues at the start of pre-season. The club is desperate for a creative midfielder – no one knows what is happening with Cesc Fabregas next season – and Baker has an opportunity to fill that role. At the very least he could be looking at a higher profile loan.
Tammy Abraham is in a similar boat to Baker. He had a brilliant season on loan at Bristol City and while he certainly has an outside shot at finding a way into the Chelsea side next season, he more likely will secure a loan at a better club.
If Chelsea’s coaching staff were paying attention to the game they would have been thoroughly disappointed. While a lot of the blame lies on non-Chelsea players, the young Blues did very little to change the outcome of the game. They must improve over the course of the tournament if they stand a chance of breaking into Antonio Conte’s plans next season.