Strasbourg defender Ben Chilwell is on a mission to silence anyone who has doubted him, and he’s aiming to do it in the loudest way possible by fighting his way into England’s World Cup squad.
After years of stop-start progress at Chelsea, where he once lifted the Champions League trophy in 2021, the 28-year-old is trying to revive a career that has been repeatedly knocked off course. A torn cruciate ligament, followed by a World Cup-crushing hamstring injury in 2022, left him battling setbacks that stalled his momentum.
Things only grew tougher when Enzo Maresca arrived at Stamford Bridge. Chilwell struggled to impress the new manager and was eventually lumped into what became known as the club’s “bomb squad” a group of players the coach deemed surplus to requirements.
A loan move to Crystal Palace last season did little to repair his fortunes, but Chilwell refused to let the narrative end there. In September, he made a decisive break, leaving the Premier League for a permanent switch to Strasbourg in Ligue 1, where he’s now rebuilding from the ground up.
He returns to face Palace on Thursday in a UEFA Conference League showdown a timely reminder of how far he’s come, and how much he still wants to prove.
For Chilwell, earning a World Cup call-up would be more than a personal triumph. It would be, in his own words, the ultimate statement to the critics who counted him out.
