The 2022-23 academy campaign at Chelsea was interesting and largely promising, yet there was a sense of business left unfinished, of meat being left on the bone, and of work still to do. Mark Robinson’s Development Squad challenged long and hard for the PL2 title before falling short in the season’s final weeks, while the Under-18s saw a good start fall away to a tough middle before finishing strong under…
Here we go again, then. It hardly seems like yesterday that we were welcoming the sixteen-strong class of 2022 but, after a year in which those players made significant strides in their first season as full-time footballers, it’s time to welcome another cohort of scholars into the academy. The class of 2023 is a little different to most recent intakes in that the number of graduates coming through the Cobham…
This summer is reportedly set to be a seminal moment in the grand history of the Chelsea ‘Loan Army’. For a decade or more now, the Blues have been at the forefront of the organised outsourcing of youth development for 18-22 year-old prospects considered too good for academy football but not quite ready for the big-time at Stamford Bridge. Those prospects have occasionally yet consistently been joined by overflow from…
In the last few editions of these summaries, I’ve made a point of noting how long it’s been since the academy won the FA Youth Cup or dominated in the silverware department. After another campaign without a trophy at Under-18, 19 or 21 levels, it would be easy to do that. With each passing year, though, it becomes less relevant; an inaccurate barometer of where Chelsea find themselves right now….