Another Chelsea loanee set to stay in Spain's La Liga next season

Even for a loanee, Christian Atsu is a name we've hardly mentioned all season.  The man who was nominated for the Ballon d'Or ... shortlist ... for the shortlist has barely played all season.  In fact, he's hardly played at all since his star turn for Ghana at the 2014 World Cup.  In the two years since, on loan at Everton and AFC Bournemouth and now Malaga, he's made a grand total of 23 appearances for a meager sum of 743 minutes.  To put that into perspective, that's 100 minutes less than Kenedy has played for Chelsea all season.

Atsu joined Malaga in January after a stress fracture limited him to just two appearances in the first half of the season at Bournemouth.  But after scoring on his debut in La Liga, he immediately injured himself again, and has played only sparingly since recovering.  Despite the less than impressive returns, Malaga are apparently keen on retaining Atsu for next season as well.

According to AS, now that the Chelsea loanee has settled and acclimated to Spain, Malaga are counting on him to make more of an impact next season.  They are supposedly looking for another loan, but with only two years left on Atsu's Chelsea contract at the end of this season, it would also make sense for us to sell.  It's not like the 24-year-old was ever going to be anything other than a (small) profit-vehicle, following his opportunistic, bargain-priced (£3.5m acquisition in 2013 from FC Porto.