Chelsea director of football still believes “highly rated” 19 year old can make first team impact | OneFootball

We’ve reached the final international break of 2025, giving us a chance to catch up on a few storylines which fell to the wayside during the busy last few weeks.

Chelsea teen still could make first team impact, director hopes

Ishe-Samuels-Smith trains with the first team. (Photo by James Fearn/Getty Images)

One story which was significant in the summer involved Ishe Samuels-Smith. The Chelsea academy defender joined our sister club Strasbourg – only to have the move reversed a few weeks later after Ben Chilwell made the move, with the 19 year old then moving on loan to Swansea instead.

It’s not been easy for him there – he’s largely been stuck on the bench, and only made his first Championship start last weekend. Things are starting to look up, however, as Swans boss Alan Sheehan increasingly turns towards a back 5 that opens up a space for ISS at left wing back.

Football.London’s piece on the star claims that Chelsea director Joe Shields is a big fan of Samuels-Smith despite his rocky period, and is convinced he can still make an impact on the Blues first team. We wouldn’t rule it out – we heard great things from the Development Squad last season – but the kid will have to really kick things up a gear in the rest of this season.

In other news…

Pedro Neto is one of the senior players in this group now and he delivered like one with a great outing against his former team Wolves. He talked through the reasons he thought his team had been able to get the win.

One of the big positives from Chelsea’s win was the performance of Enzo Fernandez, who is battling through a bone bruise to play at a really high level right now. Various pundits have given him serious praise for his grit.