Now is the time’: Chelsea’s academy director believes the club made the right decision in signing his ‘amazing’ talent.

Now is the time’: Chelsea’s academy director believes the club made the right decision in signing his ‘amazing’ talent.

Andoni Bombin, academy director at Independiente del Valle, praised Chelsea’s choice to take a chance on Kendry Paez.

Chelsea completed a £17 million agreement with IDV in June to recruit Kendry Paez, despite the fact that the midfielder was still only 16 years old, but Bombin claims he would have done the same thing if he were in Chelsea’s shoes.

Bombin told the Daily Mail of Chelsea’s decision to sign Paez: “I think Chelsea understand that this [signing him] is an investment, a good project.” I’d do the same if I were a club. Currently, all of the clubs are engaged in a fierce battle in the market. You must choose the talent as quickly as feasible. If you do not do this, someone else will.

“Now is the time to try to identify talent and bring it with you, even if it means waiting two years.” It requires investment, and you must bet on this [talent], thus I believe the decision is correct.

Paez is only 16 years old, yet Ecuador manager Felix Sanchez gave him his senior debut against Uruguay yesterday.

Chelsea is putting together a future team.
Paez, whose skill has been characterized as “incredible” by Moises Caicedo, is not Chelsea’s only recent signing.

Todd Boehly and Clearlake Capital have brought in Carney Chukwuemeka, Cesare Casadei, and Andrey Santos since taking over the Blues.

If their developments go to plan, in the near future, Chelsea could have a group of really young but talented players in their first team.

There is always the chance, though, that they just sell on Chukwuemeka, Paez or whoever for profit.

Their transfer strategy is certainly an interesting one and it may not be a while until we see whether it has paid off or not.

With the amount of talent that Chelsea have recruited, though, at least one or two of those players have to come good and make an impact in the first team. And if Paez is already featuring for his country, maybe the Ecuador international will be one of them.