Going into the 2023/24 season, there were not too many players Chelsea supporters were more excited about seeing than Carney Chukwuemeka. The 20-year-old had a stop-start debut campaign with the Blues after making the £20million move from Aston Villa in the summer of 2022 but the new season looked to be his time to shine.
Chukwuemeka, who is considered to be one of the brightest talents in English football, started the first game of the season in the 1-1 draw with Liverpool at Stamford Bridge. The England Under-20 international was playing alongside Raheem Sterling just a bit deeper off Nicolas Jackson.
Chelsea, on the day, were super impressive and were really unfortunate not to come away with all three points against Liverpool, who more than four months on are top of the Premier League table. Chukwuemeka was one of the standout performers for the Blues – and such a performance led to Mauricio Pochettino sticking with the midfielder seven days later away at West Ham United.
And that is when he really started to show his supreme talent. After some lacklustre defending from the Hammers, they gifted the ball to Chukwuemeka in the penalty area and he made them pay. First he dropped his shoulder and set the ball out onto his right foot to completely sell Tomas Soucek, before rifling the ball past Alphonse Areola to level the game.
That was on 28 minutes and Chukwuemeka had his first competitive goal for Chelsea since signing more than 12 months prior. It felt like a moment where he could really kick on with the west Londoners under a new head coach.
But about 17-or-so minutes later, devastation struck for Chukwuemeka. The former Aston Villa midfielder went down just before half-time clutching his knee and he looked in serious
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