John Terry Injury, New Chelsea Signing, And Other News Tidbits

Yeah, you read the title right - according to the Daily Mail, John Terry has suffered a back injury and as a result was forced to pull out of Friday's training session. His presence at Stamford Bridge on Saturday for our game against Everton is now also in doubt. Terry, of course, has played through injury before and could well do so tomorrow, but if this problem is severe enough to warrant a medical scan and a skipped training session, it may well be best if the captain sits this one out.

This, incidentally, is one of the reasons Chelsea were reluctant to let Alex go over the summer - despite being one of the toughest characters in football Terry's been playing on the very verge on injury for so long that his body can't really be trusted not to break down on a semi-regular basis. With Alex, Branislav Ivanovic and David Luiz all available to fill in for him, resting the captain wouldn't be the end of the world.

In happier news, Chelsea have made a new signing. Granted, 0.001% of you (I say, imagining that 100,000 people are reading) will know who he is, but apparently he's a very exciting young footballer by the name of Oluwaseyi Ojo. Ojo is 14, comes to us from Milton Keynes' youth system, and cost the ludicrous sum of £2M, making him the most expensive youth signing in the history of the world. £2M! 14!

Fortunately for Chelsea, he's also apparently amazing. The Blues apparently submitted three bids in 45 minutes while watching him play for the England under-16s, which gives you an idea of how highly they regard him. They're hardly alone in their fondness for Ojo's talent - apparently several other big teams, including Liverpool and Manchester City, were also after the youngster's signature. The midfielder's already training with the Don's first team as well. However, I'd urge caution, here - it's impossible to tell how a player will develop that young, and as good as Ojo is supposed to be, he's far from a guarantee to be a name we ever hear again. Them's the breaks.

Hopefully, though, he'll turn out grand. £2M!

And, finally, from that same article, here's Andre Villas-Boas on the four Chelsea players with whom the club's negotiating an extension:

Even if it reaches a situation that they haven’t signed contracts by January, their personality and what they have been doing for this club allows this club to think their loyalty to the team will not be compromised. We won’t need to sell them. It happens all the time. That’s why the talks are on-going. We still have plenty of time.

In other words, I wouldn't be expecting anyone to go anywhere in January. This may make some of you rather sad RE: Salomon Kalou, and is a bit of a surprise to me as well - it implies that the club genuinely wants to keep each of Didier Drogba, Nicolas Anelka, Jose Bosingwa and Kalou around, and with the age of the first two and the unreliability of the latter pair... well, that's not the same choice I would make.