When Chelsea started buying every young player under the sun after the arrival of Todd Boehly, they didn’t waste time in going after some of the up and coming Frenchmen such as Lesley Ugochukwu.
They spent €27m on the 19-year-old to convince Stade Resnais to sell him, and while he was always one for the future, the transfer fee suggested they would use him a bit more than they have.
While he has played in the EFL Cup, he has struggled to make a space for himself in Mauricio Pochettino’s plans for the Premier League, which is worrying Thierry Henry, France’s U21 manager, as he explained in quotes relayed by L’Equipe.
Normally a key part of his plans, the former Monaco manager has admitted that Ugochukwu’s situation at Stamford Bridge isn’t ideal, and if it doesn’t change soon, he might have to think twice about selecting him.
He said: “His situation is different (to Johann Lepenant’s) at Chelsea because he has players like Enzo Fernandez and Moises Caicedo in front of him, but he finds himself not playing, and, these days, these players don’t even play with the reserve team to find some rhythm.
“At the start of the season, you can make use of the pre-season, but those benefits disappear and I hope that he’s going to be able to last.”
That doesn’t sound like the most optimistic train of thought, and it’s clear that if Pochettino doesn’t start using him more, the 19-year-old might have to consider leaving Chelsea for game time, at least temporarily.
This, however, is something he will have to sort out with his club in the coming weeks.
