Charly Musonda Jr, 25, has now left Chelsea after his contract expired with the club. He spent a decade at the club. The former Belgian u21 international was touted to be one to break into the first team at Stamford Bridge, but injuries hampered those claims.
Musonda Jr is now a free agent, and given that he has been involved in the Belgian youth set-up for years, maybe he’s on the radar of Blades board member, Jan Van Winckel, who has expert knowledge of Belgian football.
At 16 and 17 years of age, the attacking player looked an absolute gem in the youth academy at Chelsea. This led to him being called up to represent Belgium in the u16’s, and u17’s.
The Belgian spent a few years in the academy before earning his first senior loan move to Real Betis in LaLiga, in the 15/16 season. Musonda Jr featured 16 times for the Spaniards, adding a goal to his name and two assists.
He made a great impression in his first season, so both parties agreed to set up another loan spell at the club in the 16/17 campaign. However the spell was cut short after the player sustained knee ligament damage. The Belgian managed eight games in his second spell.
After recovering from the injury, Charly Musonda Jr broke into the Chelsea team in the 17/18 season featuring in nine games, and he made full use of those minutes by scoring 4 times across all competitions and assisting two teammates.
This prompted Celtic to sign the promising youngster, though he spent most of his time sitting on the bench during his spell in Scotland.
Charly Musonda Jr completed a loan move to Eredivisie side Vitesse in 2018. At just 21 years of age, Musonda then suffered another knee injury, but only this time it was a serious one which kept him out for the full season.
The talented attacker underwent surgery in the 19/20 season, and has since spent the last couple of years recovering from his knee injury. Last season he played twice in the Premier League 2 for Chelsea’s u23’s, then he didn’t feature for the rest of his campaign.
There is no questioning Musonda’s ability, but his injury record is slightly concerning. Having had surgery on his knee, he’ll be hoping those injury problems are well behind him, and at 25 he’ll hope to kick on from here.
Having said that, with the United board having strong links to Belgian football, and with United in need of replacing Morgan Gibbs-White’s flair ability, could Charly Musonda Jr peak the interest of United?
Pique their interest, not peak