Is Jose Mourinho Right to Keep Ignoring the Claims of Ruben Loftus-Cheek?
Chelsea have been the club of English football this past decade.
They've won everything at home and abroad. They even completed a unique European double when they lifted the Champions League trophy in 2012, followed by the Europa League's a season later.
Some have come close, but no other Premier League side has enjoyed that same level of success Chelsea have. If there's been a trophy to win, they've won it.
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Yet there remains an elephant in the room: the Blues' lack of homegrown stars.
It's been the stick used to continually beat them. Until Jose Mourinho starts blooding youth at Stamford Bridge, it will remain so, too.
In order to live up to their billing as an elite club, it's paramount Chelsea move in that direction. It's not enough to buy talent to win trophies; the best clubs make their own stars as well.
Barcelona have built their reputation on that principle, as have Manchester United.
Indeed, Arsene Wenger's legacy at Arsenal isn't what it should be in terms of trophies won, although he's earned respect for building the club from the academy up.
It's precisely that which Chelsea must strive to achieve.
Ruben Loftus-Cheek is the latest young hopeful looking to emulate John Terry's success in west London.
Terry has been the anomaly in the Roman Abramovich era, of course—he's the academy graduate who has outlasted every mega-bucks signing in his time. He's been the lynchpin of the club's success.
He'll be 35 in December, though. Terry's career is winding down, and there's a real danger that when he eventually departs, the academy will lose its connection with the first team.
Not since the turn of the century have we not seen a homegrown player regularly turning out for Chelsea.
Every club needs ambassadors, those who connect the future with the past to maintain its identity. Terry's done that at Stamford Bridge, commanding the dressing room and indoctrinating new arrivals in the club's traditions.
When he leaves, who will do those things?
It's a very real concern Chelsea face, especially in the modern era, when players aren't remaining at clubs for prolonged periods.
Player turnover is significant in the 21st century. At Chelsea alone, 57 transfers in and out of the club have been completed since 2013, when Mourinho returned as manager.
That's an average of 11.4 in each of the five transfer windows in that time.
It's not stable and doesn't lend itself to balance, either. In order to discover the same sort of balance Terry has given Chelsea in his career, the club must look within.
Mourinho's giving Loftus-Cheek his chance now isn't about that, however.
We can throw the ambassador tag at the 19-year-old, but he's about something so much more: He's a vastly talented player who is good enough to be playing for Chelsea.
Forget that he's come through the youth ranks; Loftus-Cheek possesses real quality, and Chelsea cannot afford to allow him to pass them by.
That's the risk Mourinho is playing with here.
By not playing football matches regularly, Loftus-Cheek is suffering. He's caught in that unenviable position in which clubs have failed too many others just like him in the past.
Too good for youth football, Loftus-Cheek isn't quite ready for the seniors, either. That's the view of Mourinho, at least, who often talks about the 19-year-old's need to improve tactically and show more discipline.
In order to realise his potential though, he needs games. It's Chelsea's duty to give him that opportunity.
The easy option is to send him on loan, but we've seen how that has impacted the careers of players in the past, particularly at Chelsea.
Only Thibaut Courtois has returned from such a stint to establish himself at Stamford Bridge.
Chelsea utilise the loan system for financial gain. They scout players with potential, but not always with the first team in mind.
The club buys low and sells high. Their model is structured to earn a maximum return on their investments in the way they did with Kevin De Bruyne.
The Belgian played just six games for Chelsea, yet the club earned an £11 million profit when they sold him to Wolfsburg in January 2014.
It's the loan system that did it for them, and it's the loan system that will see them take a return on many of the 34 players currently shipped out across Europe right now.
Loftus-Cheek is different. He's been at Chelsea since a young age, and the intent since he captained the youth team to FA Youth Cup success was to promote him to the first team.
A loan deal is no good for him. It's a last resort.
In fact, when we consider Chelsea's recent past, loan moves for players in Loftus-Cheek's position have often been the beginning of the end—Josh McEachran being the best example. A series of loans eventually killed his Chelsea career.
It was after the defeat to Southampton in early October that Mourinho hinted at giving Loftus-Cheek more game time.
"If everything goes normal during [the international break], he is a player to start the next game and have a run of matches to try to get that stability as a first-team choice," the Chelsea boss explained.
That "run of matches" lasted for just 45 minutes against Aston Villa. Loftus-Cheek played the first half as the No. 10 before he was replaced by Nemanja Matic at the interval, having hardly put a foot wrong.
We haven't seen him since.
What that has done to Loftus-Cheek's confidence is anyone's guess. Why Mourinho refuses to give him a chance over Chelsea's established stars, who are failing, is equally confusing.
Proven talent has Chelsea 16th in the table this season, so other than slipping into the relegation zone, things can hardly get worse.
We're not talking after a few games, either. Over a quarter of the season has passed, and the problems still remain.
Mourinho's "champions" have spent much of their credit from last season. Instead of the manager's being patient and willing them on to play their way out of this calamitous slump, they need to be looking over their shoulders. Only they're not.
Chelsea are failing, and after a poor summer in the transfer market, Mourinho's options are short on how he can remedy it.
In Loftus-Cheek, however, he has a a player eager to make his impact. He's not the finished article, but at 19, he shouldn't be.
What he is, though, is a player with undoubted potential to serve the club for the next decade and oversee the next generation of success.
Denying Loftus-Cheek now is akin to Mourinho turning his back on the entire academy project at Chelsea. He's not just doing the player an injustice, but also the club.
It's something bigger than the manager, and it's high time he acknowledged it.
Garry Hayes is Bleacher Report's lead Chelsea correspondent. All quotes were obtained firsthand unless otherwise noted. Follow him on Twitter @garryhayes
