“Fantastic player” – Enzo Maresca raves about Chelsea transfer target who could be top of their list come summer | OneFootball

Despite playing for struggling Ipswich, Liam Delap is one of the rising stars of this Premier League season without doubt.

Built like a classic Premier League number 9, and with some of the most “Barclaysman” heritage you could imagine, he’s more than capable of leading the line on his own. But after coming through the Man City academy he’s also a very modern player with amazing touch for a big man and great feet and link up ability.

In his time in the City academy he crossed over with Enzo Maresca and some other players and staff members now working at Cobham. Maresca was asked about the striker in his preview of the Ipswich game on Monday night, and had only positive things to say about his former charge:

“Liam is a fantastic player. Also for his age, we spent one year together. I think in that season, he scored 22 or 24 goals. This is a very good striker – as I’ve said many times, England are quite lucky because they have very good players, very good strikers,” the Chelsea manager said. He also noted a few of the specific highlights of Delap’s game that he likes:

“Working hard off the ball, on the ball he understands the game and he can score goals. Because of his age, I think he can be an important player for England.”

Maresca comments set to fan rumour flames

Liam Delap and Enzo Maresca at Manchester City.

Of course, given Chelsea have been among the teams linked with Delap this season, these comments are only going to fan the flames of rumour that we’re interested in the striker. If Ipswich go down (and they look odds on, as it stands) he will surely be sold on, and the Blues will be among the teams very interested, we’d wager.