By Johnny Edward:
Chelsea’s assistant manager, Gianfranco Zola has revealed that teenage star, Callum Hudson-Odoi is ahead of the former Nigerian international, Victor Moses currently at the club reports Completesportsnigeria.com.
Moses has made two substitute appearances since the start of the season and has been in and out of the team in the last one month missing the club’s last five games.
Odoi on his part is regarded as the brightest talent from Chelsea’s academy and is seen as the future of the club but he must be patient Zola stated in a pre-match conference on Tuesday.
“Callum has done extremely well in pre-season, one of the players who impressed the most with Ethan Ampadu,” Zola revealed during his press conference on Tuesday.
“They’re two players with bright futures. They are both in contention tomorrow, in the squad, and we will see.”
“We have a lot of players. We didn’t do a big pre-season, so these games can serve as a pre-season to give time for players like Christensen, about Cahill, an opportunity to get games. Callum and Ethan are the future of this club and we are going to take care of them.”
“Don’t forget that, when we played the Community Shield, he (Odoi) was in ahead of players like Victor Moses. If he hasn’t got the consideration of the value, we wouldn’t have done that. He is the future. But he’s in a very competitive team. He has to be patient, wait for his opportunities and, when they come, take them in the best way.”
On the game, the former Chelsea star stated clearly that ‘greedy’ Blues will be out to win the game.
“It is an important game. We are Chelsea and we want to play all our games and try to win all our games.”
“We’ll take it seriously. It’s not Premier League, we know. But because of who we are, what we are, we want to play and play the games as best as we can. So we will tomorrow.
“It’s an opportunity to see players who haven’t have many games so far, so that is an opportunity. But still it will be a good team.”
“Personally, as Chelsea, we are very greedy and want to win both of them if we can, so we are going to try and do the best. The game on Saturday will be huge. Huge… it’s going to be important because of the type of game. It means a lot. Starting from tomorrow, we’re going to be competitive, and then we’ll see what it is like.”
He also ruled out the duo of Antonio Rudiger and Ruben Loftus-Cheek from the game while adding that Pedro Rodriguez is a big doubt for the game.
“Ruben has had an injection and is still recovering. It’s very unlikely he’ll be able to be part of the game tomorrow. So is also Rudiger [out of the game]. Pedro is recovering very well, but it’s tough for them to be part of the game tomorrow.”