Kurt Zouma has spent the last two years out on loan away from Chelsea and now it’s the right time for the Frenchman to return to London but not Stamford Bridge. The current matchbook bonus code suggests that the French international will be on his way again.
The 24-year-old hasn’t really left much of an impression as Chelsea player during any of the three seasons he’s been part of the first team and not out on loan at Saint-Etienne, Stoke and Everton. His last spell at The Toffees under Marco Silva’s tutelage has been the best of his career, earning him a return to the France squad for the recent European Championship qualifiers against Andorra and Turkey having missed out on their victorious World Cup squad.
The spell at Everton has been so successful that the Portuguese manager wants to turn the central defender’s loan into a permanent stay. The £22.5 million-rated defender who can cover on the right of a back four built an impressive partnership with Michael Keane at the heart of Everton’s back line in the second half of the season at Goodison and Silva wants them to be his centre-half partnership going into next season. If you go to this website, you will find the latest odds on Everton for 2019/20.
The stumbling block at this point in time is the transfer ban and manager chaos surrounding his parent-club Chelsea. With Maurizio Sarri gone and nobody appointed yet it looks as if player sales will have to wait until Frank Lampard returns to the Bridge. The transfer ban might prove tricky for Zouma but with David Luiz, Andreas Christensen, Fikayo Tomori, Antonio Rudiger and Ethan Ampadu it’s thought that Chelsea will have more than enough depth in central defensive areas for next season even if the Frenchman leaves.
So all signs point towards a permanent return to Goodison for Zouma but he could be best placed staying in London and joining Unai Emery’s profligate defence. Arsenal have been linked to the Chelsea man in the not too distant past and he could just be the man The Gunners need to better their underwhelming 5th place finish from last season.
Rob Holding is just returning from a serious knee injury, Laurent Koscielny has been heavily linked with a move away, Shkodran Mustafi plays football in a similar fashion to a baby eating spaghetti and Emery doesn’t seem to have total trust in youngsters Zech Medley, Krystian Bielik, Calum Chambers or Konstantinos Mavropanos given their respective game time and loan spells last season. That leaves Sokratis as the only nailed-on starter for Arsenal next season and he’s someone who could do with a faster central defender next to him like Zouma.
Arsenal are definitely looking at central defensive options this summer and Zouma could just be the pick of the bunch particularly if the North London club can capitalise on the confusion over at Stamford Bridge and steal him away from under the nose of Everton.
