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New York Times
a day ago
- Sport
- New York Times
Former Chelsea winger Charly Musonda announces retirement after recurring injury issues
Former Chelsea midfielder Charly Musonda has announced his retirement from professional football. The 28-year-old winger was once heralded as one of Chelsea's most promising talents and a player who was set to become a mainstay in the Belgium national team. However, recurring injury issues hampered Musonda's career, leading to him announcing his premature retirement from the game in an interview with Rising Ballers. Advertisement 'It took some time,' Musonda said. 'I have been thinking about it for the last couple of years. Purely because of my own experiences and who I am as a person. 'I want to be doing things with purpose. I want to inspire and motivate people. I want to create opportunities. I am starting something new that will hopefully help players. 'Today, I have made a decision. It is a decision I have been wrestling with for a long time, but I am going to retire from professional football. It is not an easy decision, but I am building up towards the next stage now. 'I will still be involved in football. In roles to help players express themselves and giving them an opportunity to showcase how good they are.' Musonda joined Chelsea from Anderlecht in 2012 and was part of the famed Chelsea youth academy sides of the early 2010s. He made his name alongside figures like Fikayo Tomori, Ruben Loftus-Cheek, Dominic Solanke, Andreas Christensen, Trevor Chalobah, Ola Aina, Mason Mount and Tammy Abraham. Recurring knee and muscle injuries, including a long-term knee injury suffered while playing for Vitesse Arnhem in August 2019 that kept him out of action for almost three years, halted his career. Musonda went on to play for Real Betis, Celtic, Vitesse, and Levante before ending his career in Cyprus. The winger also featured for Belgium's national youth sides but never earned a senior cap. Musonda ends his career having made just 82 first-team appearances across his career. His last appearance came in the Cypriot second division while playing for Doxa Katokopias in January 2024. When asked about his struggles with injury, Musonda told The Athletic in 2023: 'It was draining, it sucked the life out of me. 'It's something I look back on and I'm proud of myself for it. I was alone for a long time. It was very lonely, very tough. Had I been fully fit and had a bigger opportunity, then obviously things could have gone differently. 'But at the end of the day, that's life, that's the way things go, and you have to have faith in the future.'
Yahoo
26-05-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
Levi Colwill a symbol of Chelsea season as key role in Champions League return helps shift narrative
Chelsea's academy graduates have been making valuable contributions since the start of the BlueCo era. But to those sentimental about these sorts of things, it must have been especially nice to see one do so while still wearing a Chelsea shirt. Until now, this post-Roman Abramovich era has been defined by a billion-pound spending spree, one which would not have been permissible without moving so many of Cobham's own on in profit-boosting sales. Thanks to Levi Colwill, though, a Chelsea boy through and through, the Blues are back in the Champions League and the narrative might just be ready to move on. With a close-range tap-in from Pedro Neto's sharp nudge, Colwill took almost all jeopardy out of Chelsea's final day, with the second-half only minutes old. It claimed a 1-0 lead over Nottingham Forest that never looked like being surrendered, even as news of Aston Villa and Newcastle's respective struggles gave Enzo Maresca's men licence to breathe. 'As a club, that's where Chelsea should be,' said Colwill, and he would know, having been brought up through the academy in an age of European success. The defender joined Chelsea's youth set-up at under-nine level in 2012, the same year the club won their first Champions League. By the second, nine years later, he had signed professional forms and had designs on breaking into the first-team. Team-mates and contemporaries with the same ambition have since been steered towards the door, some after making that breakthrough and others before they had chance. Since the Todd Boehly-Clearlake takeover, Conor Gallagher, Mason Mount, Ian Maatsen, Lewis Hall, Tino Livramento, Billy Gilmour, Ruben Loftus-Cheek, Omari Hutchinson and Callum Hudson-Odo have all been sold, the latter coming on for Forest to no avail here. Colwill, though, has been kept off-limits. Brighton failed with their advances over a permanent move in the summer of 2023, after the Englishman had excelled on loan on the south coast, and Chelsea are known to have rejected a significant offer from a major club last summer as well. He is by no means the sole surviving link between this Chelsea first-team and Cobham; Reece James is the club captain and Trevoh Chalobah was unlucky not to start here in a back-four that would have been three-quarters homegrown. Tyrique Geogre and Josh Acheampong have made the step up this season, too. But James spent most of the first half of the season injured and Chalobah only returned from his loan at Crystal Palace in January. Colwill has been a fixture, starting 35 of the 38 Premier League matches and playing 90 minutes in each of those. Only Bournemouth's Milos Kerkez has played more minutes among players aged under 23 and job security has clearly helped Colwill's development. 'I've matured a lot,' he said on Sunday. 'I'm playing for the team much more now. If you get clean sheets and get the win, that's 10 out of 10.' The 22-year-old's season has mirrored that of Chelsea's at large. It began with huge promise, a well-balanced partnership with Wesley Fofana - right-foot, left-foot; one aggressive, one athletic - sitting at the base of a team that rose as high as second in the league. Then there was the disruption that followed the first of two Fofana injuries, when the cast of deputies revolved almost week-to-week. There have been a few outright errors - that against West Ham in February sticks out - and other moments that have made clear he is not quite the finished product yet, particularly against the most physical of forwards. But in the last few weeks, Colwill has been immense, emerging as something as a totem for a team that has defied an awkward-looking run-in to win five games out of their final six. If and when Chelsea go shopping for a centre-back this summer, expect it to be for a partner, rather than an upgrade.
