Chelsea loan star Ian Maatsen suffered a serious injury while playing for Burnley in the Championship against Huddersfield on Saturday. The 20-year-old has been a key player under Vincent Kompany with Burnley eyeing an immediate return to the Premier League as they sit 14 points clear of their nearest challengers in the Championship table.
Marking his debut at Burnley with a delightful goal in the first game of the season, Maatsen has continued to be an extremely important player to Kompany's system. Completing 90 minutes on 19 occasions, Maatsen has scored five goals and contributed five assists.
However, his game at Turf Moor on Saturday was brought to a grinding halt on the hour mark after a lengthy injury delay resulted in him being stretchered off.
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The Blues have endured struggles at left-back this season with at least four players being deployed in that position. Marc Cucurella has been the main option used but Lewis Hall and Ben Chilwell have both also played there, although the latter has been absent through injury for much of the campaigns.
Significant injuries at full-back, with Reece James also missing large parts of the season, have seemingly heavily impacted Chelsea's chances of impacting the top-four race. However, the blistering full-back duo are back and available to Graham Potter.
It remains to be seen whether or not those long-term injuries to James and Chilwell will affect their games, but, if so, the Blues have already identified their successors. Maatsen has already proven what he can offer to Chelsea next season when his loan at Burnley ends, while Malo Gusto was brought in from Lyon to compete with James.
However, in just his second game after being loaned back to the French club, Gusto suffered a hamstring injury and is subsequently recovering at Cobham. The teenager now could be joined back in west London by Maatsen following his injury.
Highlighting his impact in the Championship, Maatsen was given the player of the month award for January. A tweet posted by Felix Johnston of Maatsen holding his award, captioned "starboy *star emoji* was liked by Chelsea co-owner Todd Boehly.
A long-term injury could be damaging to Chelsea's hopes of integrating him into the first-team picture as it looks as though Boehly sees him as the perfect successor or even alternative to Chilwell.
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