Chelsea: Goalkeeper Nathan Baxter doing everything by the book, hopefully

Nathan Baxter would like to put a few of Chelsea’s unofficially official rules to the test. The 21-year old goalkeeper is on his fourth loan, and believes he has done everything right en route to the Chelsea first team.

Neil Bath, the club’s Head of Youth Development, once said a player would need 150-200 senior level appearances to make it into the Blues’ first team. None of the four Cobham graduates who are regulars in Frank Lampard’s starting XI – Fikayo Tomori, Reece James, Mason Mount and Tammy Abraham – had anywhere close to that before this exigency-defined season. Abraham had the most with 128 first team appearances at Bristol City, Swansea City and Aston Villa. The others had fewer than 100, and James had only 46.

Nathan Baxter has at least 113 senior appearances. We say “at least” because one of his four loans was to non-league Met Police, which means the stats are too obscure even for TransferMarkt.

That brings us to the other policy Baxter would like to challenge. Chelsea seem to be operating under the idea that the level of the loan club is at least as important, and maybe more so, than the amount of playing time the loanee is receiving. Hence they moved Conor Gallagher 10 or so places up the Championship table from Charlton Athletic to Swansea City, which has not dented his playing time; and they kept Ethan Ampadu at Bundelisga title contender RB Leipzig despite late January interest from Bristol City, even though he is getting a Giroud-esque number of minutes from Julian Nagelsmann.

Baxter is currently with Ross County, who sits in ninth (out of 12) place in the Scottish Premiership. This is not only the highest-ranked club he has ever played with, it’s his first experience with a first-tier league.

But he has worked his way up that level. After his first loan to non-league Met Police, he moved up to the National League with Solihull Moors and then Woking. From there he entered the Football League with League Two’s Yeovil Town last season.

Should Chelsea hold it against him that the latter two teams were relegated while he was between the sticks, and that Ross County is only four points above the Scottish drop?

How should they consider that he kept 11 clean sheets in 38 starts for Yeovil Town? Yeovil had 13 clean sheets overall, tied for the ninth-most in the 24-team league. Is Yeovil Town and League Two his level, or was he outperforming the defence in front of him? That he jumped up to a first-tier league, albeit Scotland, suggests the latter. And if the latter, doesn’t Chelsea’s goalkeeper issue boil down to a keeper who is performing no better than the wobbly defence in front of him?

Obviously, we know not much more than what we just told you about Nathan Baxter’s performance. It’s one thing for people to claim to have watched Napoli the season before last, but another level of porky altogether to say they’ve watched Met Police, Solihull Moors, Woking and Ross County over the last three seasons. Hopefully Chelsea’s loan staff did, and hopefully Eddie Newton did not take all his notes on Nathan Baxter and the others with him when he took the job at Trabzonspor last month. And, of course, goalkeepers are notoriously hard for laymen to rate.

Baxter, at least, still has the ambition to play for Chelsea and the belief that he one day will, in part because he has done everything right.

"I’ve had lots of chats with senior players at the club and they all advised me to go out on loan… It’s ultimately my dream to play for Chelsea but the only way I’ll be able to do that and impress the club is if I perform well here. – The Press and Journal"

Baxter was part of the Chelsea youth team’s treble-winning side, which means he protected the goal behind Fikayo Tomori, Mason Mount and Tammy Abraham. Talent, needs of the club and the differing development paths of outfield players compared to goalkeepers brought them into the  Chelsea starting XI while Baxter works his way up the loan army.

He now sits at the intersection of these new and sometimes competing currents within the development system, not to mention the drama at goalkeeper. He’s built up the once-requisite experience on loan, but has done it well below Chelsea’s level. He followed the advice of his peers and coaches, but has removed himself from ready consideration by doing so.

At the very least, he’s playing football, which is the best thing for him as a player even if it somehow does not help him in Chelsea’s eyes.

Since this is the second day in a row we’re talking about distant possibilities for goalkeepers and how things work out along the way, we can take a quick look over at another young goalkeeper from the Chelsea youth system.

Marcin Bulka was not willing to put in the time on loan or on the bench behind Kepa Arrizabalaga, so he pushed for a move to Paris Saint-Germain. At a point in the season where he could be starting regularly at Chelsea FC, 20-year old Bulka is PSG’s fourth-string goalkeeper, having played 90 minutes all season as Keylor Navas (age 33), Sergio Rico (26) and Alphonse Areola (26) start or at least sit the bench ahead of him.

Unless Chelsea have a buyback clause on Bulka, he will not be a in a position to validate the prioritizing of minutes versus level of club.

Hopefully he is as satisfied as Nathan Baxter seems to be with his choices.