Chelsea: Kenedy and Lucas Piazon in Dublin for their ritual preseason hope

Lucas Piazon and Kenedy are in Dublin to open Chelsea’s preseason under Frank Lampard. Their departure on loan is almost a certainty, but the charade of hope is irresistible.

It’s a mark of how far Lucas Piazon is from Chelsea’s first team that your correspondent, who prides himself on never overlooking an instance of Maurizio Sarri’s managerial incompetence and who wrote at least two articles on Lucas Piazon over the last year, forgot that Sarri gave Piazon the Danny Drinkwater treatment for the first half of last season. In fact, Sarri may have actually treated Piazon even worse than Drinkwater. We know Sarri admitted his coaching ineptitude and managerial obstinacy to Drinkwater in August, letting the Englishman know he would not play during the season. For all anyone knows, Sarri went peak perfidy on Piazon before the summer transfer window closed, letting the Brazilian stay with hope but no chance.

Even after that first half, Piazon still did not go on loan until January 30. One week earlier, he was an unused substitute for the Carabao Cup semifinal against Tottenham, his only such activation under Sarri.

Piazon is usually one of the last players to leave preseason for his loan. He left on the last day of the summer transfer window in 2015 and 2016, the latter for a two-season loan at Fulham. He left in late July in 2014, and left just before the Premier League season began in 2013.

That’s a pretty functional description of a player always on the bubble, but never within it. And it’s not like Chelsea are stuck with him while they spend the summer trying to offload him. His loans are mostly to enviable destinations: Vitesse (when it really was Chelsea B), Eintracht Frankfurt and Fulham when they were making their way out of the Championship and back to the top flight.

Of course, there were three other loans in there. Piazon is the second longest-serving player in the loan army, arriving 12 days after Kenneth Omeruo.

Last season seemed like Piazon’s moment had finally come. Chelsea declined to sell him (and fellow Fulham loanee Tomas Kalas) to Fulham despite their interest in having him for their survival season. Piazon has the physical and tactical profile of a potential false-nine under Maurizio Sarri, which opened the possibility Sarri would use him as an option at centre-forward while keeping Eden Hazard on the wing. And Sarri has his strange predilections for Brazilians. But it seems Jorginho, Willian and David Luiz were all Sarri had room for in his heart or squad.

Another Brazilian, Kenedy, is hoping to make a better impression on Frank Lampard than he made on Antonio Conte, especially since his faux pas under Conte deprived him of a chance to show himself to Maurizio Sarri. Chelsea packed Kenedy off on an 18-month loan in January 2018, and this will be his first chance to be a Blue again.

Kenedy’s loan at Newcastle ended in a nadir. He had just over 100 minutes in the Premier League in 2019, after starting 12 games in the first half of the season.

Kenedy’s best potential at Chelsea seemed to be as left wingback under Conte. He was like the offensive version of Marcos Alonso: decent at his more “traditional” position, but potentially excellent in the hybrid role.

Frank Lampard will certainly approach each player with an open mind, and will build the tactics around the team. If the squad point Lampard towards a 3-4-3, Kenedy could be in the mix as the left wing-back. For any other formation, though, Chelsea have a surplus of midfielders and enough wingers in the depth chart – including Lucas Piazon – to push Kenedy down the list. Even in a 4-4-2, where Kenedy could find the best chance of playing a regular role, he would be competing against Ruben Loftus-Cheek, Callum Hudson-Odoi, Willian and possibly Ross Barkley.

Kenedy has made appearances for Chelsea in three of his four seasons attached the club. His first season seemed promising, but all signs then pointed to a loan to accelerate his development. He was a sporadic place-filler in subsequent seasons, looking like he might be moving towards a regular spot but never moving enough in that direction. Then came the social media incident and, well…

Both Lucas Piazon and Kenedy have one more year remaining on their Chelsea contract. Piazon’s estimated transfer value has gone down since arriving at Chelsea, while Kenedy’s has risen about £3 million, per TransferMarkt. Chelsea do not sell under those conditions. They may push these two to extend and then go back on loan so the club can sell them at a profit in a year or two.

However, Piazon, in particular, may not be willing to make that bargain. At age 25 with six loans to his name, he is ready for stability. He may accept wherever Chelsea stash him on loan if he refuses to extend and then take his chances to sign for free somewhere next season.

But between then and now, we have the annual ritual of hope. They have a bit more hope because of the transfer ban: they know exactly who their competition will be for a place in the squad. Neither has to worry about someone arriving in early August to knock them off the bubble. But even with Lampard’s open mind, they are still battling a lot of incumbents who have more direct experience and on-pitch relationships.

Frank Lampard will not keep someone around on false hopes or a series of confrontation-avoiding ambiguities. If either is in the squad when the window closes, we know he will play this season.

But until that last day passes, neither should feel too secure, especially not Piazon considering his history of deadline day loans. Another seems the most likely outcome.