Official: Jake Clarke-Salter joins Vitesse on loan for the season

Cobham East a.k.a. Chelsea B a.k.a. Vitesse Arnhem has officially announced that Chelsea Academy product Jake Clarke-Salter will be joining them on loan for the 2018-19 season. After a rather disappointing stint at an abysmal Sunderland, the versatile English defender will now try his luck at an address which has been a successful place for a lot of Chelsea’s loan army members before him.

At Sunderland, Clarke-Salter accumulated a total of 653 minutes in 11 games during his five-month stint up north as he started out as a starter at the constantly relegation-threatened side in the Championship. Unfortunately, after receiving a straight red against Middlesbrough in February and a further suspension immediately after returning, that was more or less the end to the defender’s promising first few games at Sunderland.

Vitesse might be playing in a league often deemed weaker than most in Europe, but it’s nevertheless been a great platform for many loanees who joined the Dutch side from Chelsea. Only recently, the talented Mason Mount celebrated an absolutely brilliant first season there, as did Matt Miazga and others before him such as Bertrand Traoré, Lewis Baker, Dominic Solanke and even Nemanja Matic, to name a few.

Clarke-Salter will most presumably be coming in due to Vitesse losing both their starting centre-backs in form of the aforementioned Matt Miazga and long time club captain Guram Kashia. One would thus expect the English youngster to get enough playing time compared to his last destination, as well as a far more stable environment in the Netherlands.

Jake Clarke-Salter was once backed by none other than captain, leader, legend John Terry to succeed him at the club as the youngster reminded the former Chelsea captain of himself. Many have high hopes for the strong and talented defender and we can only hope that Vitesse provides him with the necessary platform to quick start his career yet again.

Good luck, Jake!