Tiémoué Bakayoko to try leaving AC Milan again in January — report

Just like they warned in Inception, Tiémoué Bakayoko has been stuck in (career) limbo and try as he might, he seems unable to get back to the real football world. The 28-year-old midfielder has played a grand total of zero minutes this season at AC Milan, and has just ten (10) minutes of football and one (1) substitute appearance to his name since mid-January.

Now technically in the second season of his two-year loan from Chelsea to AC Milan, Bakayoko hasn’t completely disappeared — he has been training with the team and has been on the bench for all but one of their Serie A matches — but it doesn’t look like he’s ever going to actually play again. (Surely there’s more to that than just sporting considerations, such as some sort of conditional financial clause or whatever; though that’s just speculation on my part.)

Unsurprisingly, he’s reportedly “searching for a solution” and has “instructed his entourage to find him a new club”. Of course, that’s easier said than done, especially with Bakayoko still under contract at Chelsea as well, and through 2024, even. The report does expect that we would be open to a “low-cost deal” though at this point, it wouldn’t be shocking if we simply agreed to release him like we did with Ross Barkley over the summer. (Barkley’s a rotation player at OGC Nice these days, and surely Bakayoko could be similarly useful somewhere else.)

Good luck, Timmy!