Footie Central | Football Blog Blogging the football world
Chelsea have rejected a bid of £20 million for young defender Reece James from Crystal Palace.
The 19-year old academy graduate has never played for Chelsea at senior level, but had a highly impressive campaign on loan with Wigan Athletic on loan last season, and is regarded as an important future player for the club.
Crystal Palace are in the market for a replacement for Aaron Wan-Bissaka, sold to Manchester United for £50 million, and had ear-marked James as a likely candidate to fill that role. However, Frank Lampard wants to keep James at the club, especially given the FIFA transfer ban, which means that they are unable to sign any new players this transfer window and the next.
James had hope to go on Chelsea’s pre-season tour, but an ankle injury sustained in the Toulon tournament in June have put paid to that, and he is set to miss the start of the new campaign.
Andy is an exiled English football fan living in Cyprus. He loves all sports but football is his abiding passion, and he still has dreams every now and then about scoring the winning goal in a Wembley Cup Final, even though his playing days are long gone. He follows most major leagues, across Europe at least, and has a favoured team in each. When he’s not watching, listening, reading or downloading podcasts about football, he spend his time worrying about his beloved Arsenal.