Chelsea manager Enzo Maresca has confirmed that Raheem Sterling and Ben Chilwell do not feature in his plans and can leave the club.
Sterling and Chilwell have been deemed surplus to requirements at Chelsea with the England internationals excluded from the squad to face Manchester City at the weekend.
Chelsea are looking to reduce their overpopulated squad before the transfer deadline and Maresca has confirmed that the pair are free to explore transfers away from Stamford Bridge.
“I am not working with 42 players. I am working with 21 players,” he said at a pre-match press conference ahead of facing Servette.
“The other 15-20 players are training apart. I don’t see them. It’s not a mess like it looks from outside. Absolutely not. They can even have 20 years contract, it’s not my point. I don’t care.
“In this moment, they are training apart [from the team]. As I said, the situation, with both of them is quite clear, there is not any update on the situation.
“Brutal? I don’t think so I just had to try to be honest. I just said and I will say it again, I spoke with Raheem [Sterling] before Manchester City, I said that he is going to struggle to get minutes with us. With Chilly [Ben Chilwell], I said he is a lovely guy but with his position, he’s going to struggle with us. It’s not brutal, it’s honest.”
On whether their days at Chelsea are over: “No because they are Chelsea players. Until they aren’t Chelsea players, they will be Chelsea players. We have a big squad, for me it’s impossible to give everyone minutes so if they’re looking for minutes, probably it is better to leave and in case they don’t leave they have a contract here, they are Chelsea players.”
