Just because Chelsea are under a transfer ban doesn’t mean they need to keep absolutely everyone from Maurizio Sarri’s squad. Here are a few players the Blues should keep, loan and sell.
Chelsea have already lost one player this summer, and more will surely follow. Our writers offer a few suggestions for whose time at Stamford Bridge should come to a close, who should back after some time away and who must stay for at least one more season.
1. Sell: One obvious, one not so much
Danny Drinkwater (Abhishek Pancholi)
Spending two years in London under two Italian tacticians appears to have driven Danny Drinkwater to drink the hard stuff.
Painfully crowbarred puns aside, Drinkwater’s move to Chelsea has gone exactly as everyone thought it would. He has just spent an entire season in Bogarde mode and, before that, he was a passenger in Antonio Conte’s FA Cup winning side. Clearly, it has been an expensive disaster and the longer he is at Chelsea, the stupider the club looks.
Shifting him from Chelsea’s books may be easier said than done, since not every club conducts their business under the influence of those hallucinogens that make Danny Drinkwater look like Radja Nainggolan. Nevertheless, try we must.
Perhaps Ed Woodward might be interested in bringing back another one of Manchester United’s academy graduates to unlock Paul Pogba. Or maybe West Ham would like to add a bit of English steel to their midfield, or that other claret club, Aston Villa, might have some use for him.
And if all else fails, a Craigslist ad for £10 million or best offer should do the trick.
Willian (Scott Brant)
I lost a bit of respect for Willian once he (Ed. note: or possibly a wayward family member) disrespected Antonio Conte with the FA Cup celebration team picture on Instagram. With the addition of Christian Pulisic, Willian then becomes surplus.
To really drive the point home, Pedro should stay as the substitute off the bench.
With Callum Hudson-Odoi and Pulisic being the future, Willian will be missed, and everyone respects what he has done on the pitch, but his time has run out at Stamford Bridge. Roma or AC Milan would be interesting, so he could face Antonio Conte at Inter Milan twice each season.
Danny Drinkwater (Sourav Mahanty)
It is safe to say Danny Drinkwater’s £40 million move from Leicester City hasn’t worked out like he would have envisioned. The former England international has found it hard to even make the bench for the majority of his time at Stamford Bridge.
The board must now cut its losses and just move on Drinkwater to a mid-table team. It is unlikely they would be able to cover half of what they paid for him, but just taking him off the wage bill should be considered a win at this point.