Chelsea: Lampard may already be heading for his own De Bruyne situation

­Frank Lampard said he does not want another Kevin De Bruyne situation. No one does, but can a Chelsea manager avoid one? Could Jose Mourinho?

The January transfer window is open and some Chelsea players are likely on their way out. Some of them have barely had minutes on the pitch, so it would be no surprise if they opt to leave, perhaps by forcing a move.

The continuous, years-long groans and bickering around how Jose Mourinho handled the Kevin De Bruyne situation is unnecessary and misplaced. Most Chelsea fans would agree that Mohamed Salah did not impress for Chelsea. Yet few seem to have any issue with who he has become at Liverpool. So why do so many Chelsea fans ignore the fact that they would agree that neither did Kevin De Bruyne impress at Stamford Bridge? It is the easiest thing to look at Manchester City and get frustrated at Mourinho for selling “such a world-class player.” All that has been addressed in my earlier piece, but the one thing I did not talk about there was the collision course managers are always on with such situations.

Managers can only evaluate the players they have, and they can not always find use for all of them. Managers cannot just decide to keep players around for that time in the indefinite future when they might need them.

Frank Lampard knows this acutely, because in the current era, some managers find it easier to pull players to themselves just based on reputation. We can point to many clubs that have excellent players unable to get into the starting line-up. These players are not always happy to sit on the bench but they know that they’ll rack up some game time and many trophies working with that manager / head coach.

Lampard is in his second season as a football manager and the jury is still out on whether he’ll become an iconic manager. Some say he doesn’t know what he is doing as a head coach (when he loses to Bournemouth), some say he is a master tactician (when he outwits Mourinho at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium).

There is no unanimous agreement on whether Lampard is a good head coach or not. This means that Lampard cannot count on world class or potentially world class players coming to Chelsea just for the opportunity to be coached by him.

Jose Mourinho has that luxury. Pep Guardiola has that luxury, along with other world class, proven managers.

In the current Chelsea squad, there are many players that are hated and rated poorly by the Chelsea fan base. This hate, however, does not mean that these players are as bad as they are painted.

Football is a game of opinions and narratives. There are people who give credit to Guardiola for knowing how to use De Bruyne, forgetting that De Bruyne was a finished piece by the time he arrived at Manchester City. There’s no credit for Wolfgang Rolff and Dieter Hecking for the key roles they played in shaping De Bruyne.

Narratives. Jose Mourinho is the villain who sold Kevin De Bruyne, Pep Guardiola is the visionary that made Kevin De Bruyne world class.

Marcos Alonso and Ross Barkley have been out of favour at Chelsea until recently. Many fans were sure that Barkley had no footballing ability and he needed to be sold.

Barkley has been in excellent form when he has played for his country, not so much when he has played for his club. Barkley keeps getting called up and many are baffled as to why the terrible-no-footballing-ability Barkley is repeatedly part of his national team. Barkley had 13 Premier League goal involvements in his last season at Everton. He has seven goal involvements in six games for England in the Euro 2020 qualifiers. He barely sees playing time at Chelsea.

In the last two games, however, Barkley has shown some of the intelligence and technical prowess he displayed as a key player for Everton. “Yeah, but that’s Everton! He’s not Chelsea level!”

If only there was another player who also excelled at Everton and went on to become the most expensive striker for one of the biggest teams in England… oh wait!

This is not a call to offer Ross Barkley a new contract for the next six years – that is up to Frank Lampard, Petr Cech and the rest of the football staff.

Should Lampard decide to sell Barkley, it should come as no surprise if he excels elsewhere, maybe even in the Premier League. Barkley is obviously a good player, but if Lampard decides to sell him and he excels elsewhere, it should not and would not be a knock on Lampard for letting him go. Barkley can only sit on a bench for so long before he decides he’d like a little more playing time. That is, the same decision Kevin De Bruyne made.

Marcos Alonso has a Premier League title from when he played a key role under Antonio Conte. He has not looked as formidable in a two center-back formation.

Nonetheless, Alonso is a good player and can be a deciding factor in key games. Many would disagree, but that doesn’t make it false. Marcos Alonso has had 27 league goal involvements in 103 appearances. For a defender, that is impressive. But Twitter merchants would have you believe he’s bad because Raheem Sterling runs past him.

For a defender to get into as many goal scoring positions as often as Alonso does, it underlines his intelligence, excellent positioning and good spatial awareness.

Inter Milan is said to be interested in signing Alonso. Antonio Conte is the man who showed Alonso’s brilliance to the world, so the move makes sense. Inter Milan are going toe-to-toe with Juventus for the Serie A title.

Alonso in the Inter line-up could be the reason Inter win it, along with many other trophies. Should that happen, Lampard should not be knocked for not keeping Alonso.

Football fans are fickle. Chelsea fans even more so. At the time De Bruyne was sold there was no outcry – only when De Bruyne landed back at the Premier league did people start regretting the sale.

Every sale by a club always creates a possibility for him to go elsewhere and not only excel but also hunt his former club(s). That will not and should not deter managers from selling players they do not think would start fairly regularly for them. Jose Mourinho has also sold many other players who have not become world-class.

Managers have tough decisions to make. That’s why they are paid big money. Sometimes it’s more important to give players a chance to become something more, somewhere else.

It’s cute that Frank Lampard is determined to avoid another De Bruyne situation, however that may be out of his hands. And that’s OK.