Paez to train with Strasbourg, play with Chelsea then go back to France: development plan confusion | OneFootball

There’s been conflicting news in the last 24 hours about Chelsea’s intention with Kendry Paez.

There were reports in French paper L’Equipe yesterday that the loans of young Chelsea midfielder Mathis Amougou, as well as Ecuador talent Kendry Paez, both to our sister club Strasbourg, were “almost complete.”

However in the case of Paez, other sources have fought back today and claimed that’s not the case.

Teradeportes in Ecuador claims that Paez is just going to “train at the French club as part of a process of adapting to European football.”

Crucially, he’s in our plans for the Club World Cup.

The timeline for this is what we’re not clear about. With the season in Ecuador now over, presumably this means that Paez will go and train with Strasbourg now, then join the Chelsea squad in June in the buildup to the Club World Cup.

But why do that if Paez can just train with Chelsea until then? Surely that’s more valuable to him both immediately and in the long term?

The only explanation we can think of is that Paez will in fact play for Strasbourg next season, and thus will get a couple of months settling in there, before playing officially with Chelsea then heading to loan to Strasbourg after the conclusion of the Club World Cup.

It all seems unnecessarily complicated to us.

Loan laws make Chelsea decisions difficult

Mathis Amougou trains for Chelsea for the first time!

It should also be remembered that Chelsea’s hands are often tied by the rules around loans. There is a limit to many they can have concurrently, a limit to the total number they can send abroad, and most pertinently in this case, a maximum of 3 players they can send to any one club.

That means some tough decisions in the summer, and usually a little bit of shuffling around in January too to maximise those slots.

Amougou looks a lock to take one of them – he’s young, French, needs minutes, and will play in a role vacated by Andrey Santos when he returns to Chelsea.

The other two are up for grabs.