João Félix's final act in a Chelsea shirt will be missing a glorious chance in the dying embers of the 2022-23 season, with incoming head coach Mauricio Pochettino apparently not wanting to keep the rather frequently misfiring and highly paid attacker around for another loan (or more).
Atlético Madrid president Enrique Cerezo revealed this development in an interview with reporters yesterday, adding that they have absolutely no idea what they're going to do now. But that's no longer our problem!
"The truth is that I can't tell you the plan with João.
"The news that we received yesterday is that the new manager doesn't count on him at Chelsea. We don't have anything planned, João is an Atlético player for now."
-Enrique Cerezo; source: Marca via ESPN
Atléti were clearly hoping that we'd take on another Félix loan, but given our massively bloated squad of underperformers, this is probably the best course of action for us right now.
Félix, who joined in January, wasn't our only loanee, and it sounds like a similar fate awaits Denis Zakaria, who had been with us since the start of the season. According to reports, he will be heading back to Juventus.
The 26-year-old midfielder has barely featured at all, other than a brief run in the side around the turn of the year. And that's unfortunate as his arrival seemed like a smart move - a defensive midfielder! - but for whatever reason, it didn't quite work out for him.
We did have a buy-option on him, but unsurprisingly we will not be exercising it.