Here is your Chelsea morning digest on Sunday, January 10.
Blues to enter Upamecano race
Chelsea have become the latest club to express an interest in RB Leipzig defender Dayot Upamecano, according to a report from the Daily Mail.
Upamecano is one of the most sought-after centre-back talents in European football and reports have claimed he has a £40million release clause that becomes active in the summer.
Leipzig are determined to keep hold of the 22-year-old this month, but might not be able to do too much if clubs come looking for him once the season ends.
The report claims that Arsenal have previously held talks to sign the Frenchman, and Manchester United have been interested - while Liverpool are monitoring the situation.
Chelsea are the latest club to express their admiration of the highly-rated Upamecano, with doubts over the future of the likes of Antonio Rudiger, Fikayo Tomori and Andreas Christensen.
Grant sends Abramovich message
Former Chelsea boss Avram Grant believes the club's hierarchy should give Frank Lampard more time as manager, despite his side's poor recent form.
There have been questions asked over Lampard 's future recently, with the Blues winning just one out of their last six Premier League outings.
His side have subsequently slipped to ninth in the table, but despite the poor recent showings, Grant has called on Roman Abramovich to give the current manager more time.
The ex-Blues boss said in an Instagram post: "What I can say to Frank and the others at the club is be patient, and more than this do whatever is necessary to do that for sure.
"Two things - never lose it even when things are going well, don't lose your fighting spirit at the highest level. And second, don't lose what you have here [points at head], you need to think right and look for solutions.
"If you do that then everything will be okay because the quality is there and there is a potential like there was, during my time [at Chelsea]."
Read the full story here.
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Wonderkids spotted in training
Chelsea have been putting in their final preparations for today's FA Cup third-round clash with League Two side Morecambe.
The Blues came runners-up to Arsenal in last season's competition and will be looking to do one better this time around and face a clash with a club from the fourth tier of English football at Stamford Bridge.
Speaking ahead of the match, Lampard has revealed that youngsters Tino Anjorin, Tino Livramento, Jude Soonsup-Bell, Lewis Bate and Henry Lawrence could all play a part in this afternoon's tie.
"We've called up both Tinos (Anjorin and Livramento), Jude (Soonsup-Bell), who has been scoring goals in the youth team. We’ve called up Lewis Bate who has trained with us before and Henry Lawrence," the Blues boss explained.
"It’s a great experience for them and it’s something I’ve wanted to do and last season was able to do pre-restart."
As well as this, Lampard also revealed that right-back Reece James is not quite ready to return to action following his injury, after the England international was absent from training.
"Reece James is out for the game. He will train with us tomorrow but the game will come too early," Lampard said in his pre-match press conference on Friday.
