Chelsea have opted against including Papy Djilobodji, their surprise £2.7m deadline day signing from Nantes, in their squad for the group stage of this season’s Champions League having reached their limit of non “locally trained players” on their submitted A-list.
Uefa rules stipulate that participating clubs can name no more than 25 senior players in their squad, with a minimum of eight places reserved exclusively for “club trained” and “association trained” players. Chelsea have included their major summer arrivals – the three-times European Cup winner Pedro Rodríguez, Radamel Falcao, Asmir Begovic and Baba Rahman – in their squad, but were effectively left to pick two of three players to complete their number.
Faced with that choice, they chose to nominate the young forwards Bertrand Traoré and Kenedy, who made his debut after his £6.3m move from Fluminense in Saturday’s 2-1 home defeat to Crystal Palace, at Djilobodji’s expense.The Premier League champions will therefore go into the group stage of the competition with John Terry, Gary Cahill and Kurt Zouma as their recognised centre-halves, with Branislav Ivanovic, Rahman and Cesar Azpilicueta as full-back options.
Chelsea will go into the competition with a 22-man senior squad, three short of the maximum allowed, due to the lack of association trained and club trained players – as defined by Uefa’s rules – available. The London club have loaned out 33 players to clubs around the world but can call on academy talents, such as Ruben Loftus-Cheek, to bolster their numbers if required. The latter qualifies for the B-list as a player born after 1 January 1994 and eligible to play for Chelsea for an uninterrupted 24-month period since he turned 15.
Djilobodji was an unexpected arrival this week with the champions’ defence having already shipped nine goals in their four league games this season. The Senegal international joined despite interest from Celtic, Celta Vigo and Trabzonspor for a cut-price fee having entered the final 12 months of his contract at Nantes. The centre-half had been training with the youth sides at the French club having made clear his desire to leave.
Chelsea’s other deadline day signing was Michael Hector from Reading, who had been close to moving to Crystal Palace. The 23-year-old promptly became the 33rd of those loan players by rejoining his former club for the rest of the season.
