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We're getting down to the final weeks of the season for most of our loanees before they return to London for the summer or off to their respective national teams for international duty. It was a slower week than normal on the loan front as several of our youth did not feature this week. Here's what happened:
- Gael Kakuta - Kakuta has had a run of pretty solid performances lately, unfortunately for Gael this weekend was not one of them. Kakuta played for 89 minutes as Dijon were a bit lucky to grab a stoppage time equalizer to steal a point. I've been critical of Kakuta in the past for trying to be a bit too fancy instead of making the simple pass on too regular a basis, and this was certainly the case on Saturday. I'm actually happy he was subbed off late, I really hope that will help to point out that he's far better off when he doesn't feel like he has to singlehandedly win the game for his club.
- Tomas Kalas - Kalas was again solid for 90 minutes as Vitesse drew a strong AZ Alkmaar team 2-2. Nothing really to report here, Kalas did his job admirably again.
- Patrick van Aanholt - PvA was an unused sub this weekend after a relatively poor week last weekend. He's certainly not been a crowd favorite since joining Vitesse, and his loan spell in general has been a bit disappointing. How he fares for the Dutch U21 side this summer will be interesting.
- Ulises Davila - Davila again did not feature for the Vitesse draw. Surprised?
- Kenneth Omeruo - Omeruo now seemingly owns the right back position for Den Haag, and he bounced back from a rough showing against Ajax very well. He didn't look overly threatening going forward, but he very rarely has. I really see Omeruo excelling as either a center back or a holding midfielder in the long term, but as I've stated several times before I'll settle for any extended time on the pitch at this point. He's reportedly been impressing the Nigerian coaching staff, so there's a very good possibility that he'll be making his senior team debut over the summer.
- Milan Lalkovic - Lalkovic was not on the bench over the weekend.
- Josh McEachran - Little Josh didn't feature as Swansea played a very entertaining game against Tottenham. I imagine he's still making progress training with the Welsh side, but some game time would be pretty nice to see.
- Matej Delac - Delac made yet another start in a cup tie midweek, but I'd have to assume it will be his last unless there is an injury. After being drubbed 4-0 over the weekend, Delac saw 5 find the back of his net as their cup run was ended. While none were due to individual error on his part, it's hard not to think he could have played a bit better when 5 goals get by him. He was back on the bench for the weekend, and I imagine he'll remain there for the rest of the season. Since most of you have never seen him, here are lots of balls finding the net behind him:
- Jeffrey Bruma - Bruma again found himself on the bench as Michael Mancienne started in the center of the defense. I'm not sure if something is going on there, but the decision to start Mancienne is a bit baffling due to his absolutely awful play thus far this season. I'll be pretty disappointed if Bruma is relegated to third choice for the remainder as he was certainly making a case for some involvement with the Dutch team in the Euros this summer.
- Sam Walker - Walker may have been the most impressive youngster we had this week. After a rough couple of outings at Yeovil, it was certainly nice to see Walker bounce back with a performance that almost single handedly saved a point for his club in a goal free draw over the weekend. He had a number of highlight reel type saves to his credit, and really showed flashes of solid potential.
- Rhys Taylor - Taylor also kept a clean sheet over the weekend, but his was far more routine than Walker's was. It was s typical solid fundamental display from the young Welshman, he'd certainly be a capable third choice keeper had we not resigned Hilario.
- Thibaut Courtois - Two more games, two more wins. The big Belgian was solid against Hannover midweek in Europa competition as Atletico put themselves in a great position for the second leg this week. He then kept yet another clean sheet in La Liga play over the weekend. He's pretty universally established himself at this point as the best U21 keeper on the planet, so I'd expect the Chelsea hierarchy to take a long look at him this summer. Selling Cech is certainly a possibility if whomever we appoint to run the team so chooses.
- Ben Gordon - What more is there to say about Gordon? He played another 90 minutes. He was good, he wasn't great. He'll likely have a pretty solid career bouncing around the lower levels of England and Scotland, but I just can't picture him ever wearing a Chelsea kit.
- Kevin De Bruyne - Like Kakuta, De Bruyne had a quiet weekend as Genk was mostly on the backfoot against Club Brugge. They'd eventually lose 2-0 with very little in the way of chances. Hopefully the rest of the playoff push goes better for De Bruyne.