Chelsea star ‘offers himself’ to Barcelona as exit talk around Pochettino favourite refuses to go away

A Chelsea star has reportedly ‘offered himself’ to Barcelona as the exit talk surrounding one of Mauricio Pochettino’s favourite players refuses to go away.

It goes without saying that this campaign has been an underwhelming one for Chelsea and a number of their top stars could already be eyeing up the exit door.

While Enzo Fernandez has a contract at Stamford Bridge which runs until the summer of 2031, there has been some exit talk surrounding the 23-year-old of late.

Chelsea splashed a gigantic £107million fee on the Argentine midfielder just 12 months ago, but his long-term future at the club could already be in doubt.

According to Sport, Fernandez is ‘looking for a way to leave London’ and has ‘offered himself’ to Barcelona. Given his importance to Chelsea and the length of his contract, this would be an incredibly difficult deal to manoeuvre.

The Spanish giants aren’t exactly in the best financial situation right now and landing a deal for the 23-year-old would likely be problematic from their end too.

It is worth pointing out that the report does state that a move to Spain at this stage would be ‘highly unlikely’ although the word ‘impossible does not exist’ in football.

READ MORE: Tottenham, Chelsea ‘willing’ to pay for £51m Barcelona star ‘likely’ to be sold against his wish

Agent pours cold water on rumours

Fernandez scored a sublime free-kick against Aston Villa in midweek and the player’s agent has insisted that his client will not be leaving the club any time soon.

“The player has no intention of leaving,” Uriel Perez told AS.

“The Chelsea hierarchy were very clear with this project. It’s a plan that was always going to be difficult at the beginning because new and young players were going to arrive.

“But when the pieces of the team all fit together, Chelsea are going to move forward.

“Enzo’s desire is to be on the team and win trophies. We have not met with any clubs or even tried to talk to any clubs, that’s not true.

“We know what the player’s desire is. Obviously, he would like Chelsea to be in a better position [in the league] but that will be achieved with hard work.”

The World Cup winner was always going to find it difficult to live up to his lofty price tag, but generally speaking, he has been one of Chelsea’s more consistent performers since his arrival.

Of course, Fernandez still has a long way to go in order to prove his worth, but his quality on the ball is obvious for everyone to see.

Pochettino pleased with his development

The 23-year-old looked razor-sharp during Chelsea’s FA Cup triumph over Aston Villa and Pochettino was quick to shower the midfielder with praise.

“Today, Enzo showed why he’s here and he showed his quality,” the Chelsea boss told reporters after the game.

“But we didn’t have any doubts about him, or about [Moises] Caicedo or about different players, young players that arrived here with expectation to win titles and to score with every single touch!’

“He is a world champion player. Look, when he signed one year ago, he arrived after nearly two years with no holidays, no rest, with the pressure, still young, different environment, different language, different culture, a team that needs time to build. All of these types of circumstance, you need time”

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