It’s expected to be a quiet January transfer window at Chelsea Football Club, though that doesn’t mean we’re not going to see any player movement whatsoever.
Could Jorrel Hato be among those possibly looking for minutes elsewhere in the second half of the season? That is surely highly unlikely, but rumors in the Netherlands claim that his former team, Ajax Amsterdam, have made it their top priority to engineer a reunion.
The report from De Telegraaf acknowledges that it’s “questionable” whether Chelsea
would even consider letting Hato go back to Ajax on loan, but they do so without ever mentioning that in order to do so, we would need to first recall one of the six loanees we currently have out on foreign assignments. Those six include Mike Penders, Mamadou Sarr and Kendry Páez at Strasbourg, Nicolas Jackson at Bayern Munich, Aarón Anselmino at Borussia Dortmund, and David Datro Fofana at Fatih Karagümrük. Only Páez is a realistic option for a recall among those, with the 18-year-old not quite settling in as well as we had hoped.
Even so, letting Hato leave would be a bit silly. The 19-year-old may not have played much so far, and played well even less often — 9 appearances (7 starts) across all competitions — he’s the only recognized backup for Marc Cucurella and is versatile enough to play at center back as well. Cucurella’s hamstring may be a concern now, and though Hato’s also been dealing with a minor problem causing him to miss Saturday’s game, in theory, this is where he would be stepping in and stepping up, rather than stepping away.
