Chelsea loan Lewis Baker, no closer to a replacement in Danny Drinkwater
By George Perry
Chelsea sent one more player away from Stamford Bridge without any movement towards a replacement. Lewis Baker signed a five-year contract at Chelsea before heading to Middlesbrough on loan.
Danny Drinkwater took a major step towards signing with Chelsea on Friday night. He missed Leicester’s opener due to injury, just the way the Blues like their midfield transfer targets. While Drinkwater watched Leicester ship four goals to Arsenal, Chelsea sent another English midfielder – Lewis Baker – on the train north to Middlesbrough.
Chelsea hopefully only sent Baker away because they were confident in their progress towards signing Danny Drinkwater or some other midfielder. The Blues already sold Nathaniel Chalobah and Nemanja Matic, and loaned Ruben Loftus-Cheek, without any apparent thought or plan as to who would replace them. Even if Tiemoue Bakayoko were healthy, he was not part of Antonio Conte’s early season plans.
All this leads to the questions: Who was – and in light of recent events, who is – Chelsea’s intended starting midfielder other than N’Golo Kante?
Antonio Conte wanted Tiemoue Bakayoko as a long-term project rather than an immediate impact player. Some of this is due to the normal amount of incubation time Conte demands, and some may be the usual concerns about the physicality of the Premier League.
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Drinkwater obviously has the advantage over Bakayoko in the latter. However, Drinkwater has not played under any system remotely resembling Antonio Conte’s tactical demands. His only tactical advantage is his experience and rapport playing alongside N’Golo Kante at Leicester.
Of the until-recently remaining options, Lewis Baker may have been the closest candidate to Conte’s ideal. He developed his technique and tactical acumen at Vitesse, and had the benefit of pre-season to learn Conte’s methods. Bakayoko stayed in England for pre-season, so he was not even able to observe the training sessions that Baker participated in.
By dispatching Baker to Middlesbrough, the Blues somehow have even less depth than they did before. Leicester City already rejected Chelsea’s typical low-ball offer of £15 million. They are reportedly demanding £30 million, an inflated valuation, to be sure.
However, the transfer window is running short. Neither Drinkwater nor Leicester are pushing hard to make this deal happen. They have no reason to come back with a lower asking price. If anything, they will raise the price with each passing day as Chelsea’s desperation goes up. If Chelsea were to lose one of their opening games or suffer another injury at midfield, Drinkwater’s transfer fee will approach Ross Barkley levels of extortionate.
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As Chelsea are learning from their Diego Costa saga, desperation distorts the transfer market just as effectively – even if not to the extremes – as anything Mino Raiola or Paris Saint-Germain could dream up.