Crystal Palace defender Ben Chilwell has disclosed that Chelsea manager Enzo Maresca forced him to train alone at the club.
The 28-year-old was a member of Chelsea’s infamous ‘bomb squad’, alongside the likes of Raheem Sterling and Trevoh Chalobah, in the summer of 2024.
Speaking with ITV Sport, the England international opened up on the struggles of being forced to train away from the squad for months on end.
“I was training by myself a lot of the days. You’re not involved in the matchday squads and you kind of just wait for the opportunity for when you’re gonna go somewhere.
“If you go somewhere in January and you’re miles off the pace, you’ve got to put the work in. The only person who is losing out is you.
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“Training by yourself a lot for a number of months isn’t easy but I think the only thing that was keeping me going was I knew I was going to go somewhere, whether that was January or the end of the season.
“These past four or five months has given me the opportunity to to mentally and physically realign, refocus and reset to go again.
“There were a lot of circumstances at Chelsea that were not in my control, which I completely respect but the things I could control was how I came into training every day and how I trained, whether it was by myself or with the group.
“And that is a reflection on myself.
