Chelsea defenderJake Clarke-Salter, a twenty four year old youth product from their Cobham academy is believed to be of interest to the swans. Clarke-Salter is currently on loan at Coventry City, however he only returned there after five weeks out with an achilles injury recently. He spent some of November and December in recovery back at Chelsea.
The Covid Omicron outbreak has scuppered Clarke-Salter’s chances of game time but he did feature on the bench in the 1-0 home loss to Millwall last Wednesday, the sky blues first game since December 11th.
Jake Clarke-Salter, five years on loan from Chelsea
Jake has featured for England at numerous levels, and he was a big part of England’s successful World Cup win in the under 20 tournament in 2017. He played in the final. Since then he has failed to get near the Chelsea first team bar playing only twenty four minutes against Aston Cilla in 2016. He has had loan spells at Bristol Rovers, Sunderland, Vittese, Birmingham City ( twice ) and now Coventry City. However at twenty four he really does need a permanent move and game time. This is what we believe the swans are interested in.
Having been hijacked by Bournemouth and their huge loan bid to Manchester United for Ethan Laird, which we can assure our readers come as a shock to Russell Martin when he was informed, the swans clearly see no wrong in a similar course of action despite this potentially being a summer move. With Ethan Laird gone, and a big ‘if’ on Jake Bidwell the swans are reacting swiftly to Laird leaving. We shouldn’t also forget the big question mark over Rhys Williams and a potential Liverpool return. Williams though could easily benefit from Laird leaving SA1with the supporters wanting Martin to utilise a back four with Ben Cabango, Brandon Cooper and two from Williams, Ryan Manning, Jake Bidwell or Ryan Bennett.
Jake Clarke-Salter is an upward trajectory career wise, and would be extremely happy to sign a deal in the championship after spending at least five years out on loan. The time of year does dictate this could be an intervention in his loan, regardless of permanency, or it could be forward planning for the summer.
The other player available on a loan from Chelsea, and also at Coventry is Ian Maatsen who coincidentally has followed a similar path from Sparta Rotterdam and PSV as Joel Piroe. The links don’t end there with both excelling at many youth levels for the Netherlands. He has a recall clause in his loan agreement this season. Sometimes at the same time. Maatsen has been at Chelsea since 2018 and like Clarke-Salter has seen a gradual progression in his career after loan spells at Charlton last season and Coventry this. Maatsen though is only nineteen is a massive talent and plays with a freedom not often seen at his age.
Ian Maatsen is highly regarded and Coventry fans love his attitude
What the swans wish to discuss we don’t know, it could be a loan, but it is far more likely at this point they are inquiring about the players availability permanently, that is pure conjecture, what isn’t is the contact to discuss matters with Chelsea. A young manager with the mindset that Russell Martin has could well be planning for the summer, either way both players would be an excellent addition to the swans squad. Especially Maatsen. Coventry should consider themselves very lucky.
As we have explained this month is going to be full of speculation, and all we can do is report what we have, and keep you informed and up to date on Swansea City.