Schalke 04 continue to consider option to bring back Chelsea left back on loan

The one issue that might be in strongest focus come next month’s winter transfer window is Chelsea’s left back situation, where Marcos Alonso continues to play the vast majority of minutes without a proper backup. As impressive as that is from the 26-year-old, he cannot be expected to keep doing that all season and not suffer injuries or at least a drop in form and fitness.

Kenedy remains a barely viable backup, so much so that out of position Victor Moses, Pedro, or César Azpilicueta have been utilized before the youngster from Fluminense, who came very close to leaving the club this summer after causing a bit of controversy on the Summer Tour of China and Singapore.

Reinforcements remain mostly pipe dreams as well, with Alex Sandro possibly back on the table since his subpar performances have not resulted in new contract extension from Juventus despite summer promises of one and Alex Telles recently reappearing in the rumor mill as well, but as nothing more than idle speculation so far (also in that category: Luke Shaw, and any other name you may come up with).

One in-house option might be Baba Rahman, but he’s not only still recovering from an ACL problem — now going on almost a year — but he remains firmly on Schalke 04’s radar as well. The Bundesliga side, where Baba was on loan when he suffered the knee injury while playing for Ghana at the Africa Cup of Nations, were ready to take him back in the summer, but further complications delayed any such arrangement (in fact, this latest report says that Baba underwent another operation of unknown complexity in September).

The report from Der Westen also claims that Baba kept his apartment (or was kept for him) in Gelsenkirchen in anticipation of an eventual move back. Schalke sporting director Christian Heidel ties any interest to Baba’s fitness, understandably, but if the 23-year-old is ready to return, he will need to go into a situation where he will be playing regularly (like Kurt Zouma’s doing this season at Stoke City in his attempts to recover from his ACL injury).

Either way, it sounds like Baba also won’t be of much help to help lighten Alonso’s workload.