Ba cools Chelsea rumours

Slam. That’s the sound of the closing of the loan transfer window for Football League teams yesterday. Bang. And that is the starter’s gun for the opening of the silly season of speculation ahead of the opening of the summer transfer window.

And where better to start than at Stamford Bridge where the date for the ‘rebuilding process’ (or ‘the project’ as AVB creepily referred to it as) has been erased out of the ‘June’ section of last year’s diary and pencilled into the ‘June’ section of this year’s. “Pencilled” probably being the operative word in that sentence.

Anyway, one of the first names to be speculated as a brick or some mortar in the rebuilding is Premier League goal machine and syrup-lover, Demba Ba.

With 23 goals in 37 league games in England and an estimated £7m release clause in his contract, Ba can probably get expect a summer of speculation about his future, despite the two years remaining on his Newcastle contract.

However, for the time being, the 26 year-old says he is happy at Newcastle, telling Sky Sports; “It is rumours like you get in football. I am happy with Newcastle and I enjoy being here and playing for the Toon Army. I enjoy being in this team. We have a good team spirit and I love the North East, where I have my country-mate, Papiss Cisse."

Check that out, a ‘part-of-the-package-of-football’ cliché, an allusion to the club’s nickname to cosy up with the fans and some fellow countryman love all in the space of a handful of sentences. That’s some media training they’ve got at whatever they call St James’ Park now.

The Sky Sports story also speculates on Cheick Tiote already agreeing a move to Chelsea for next season as a replacement for Michael Essien. Perhaps the ‘rebuilding’ process is more of a ‘rebranding’ one by simply rebranding Newcastle players as Chelsea ones?

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