Chelsea midfielder Ruben Loftus-Cheek has hailed the club for tapping into the potential of their academy.

Former manager Frank Lampard was forced to utilise Chelsea's academy, which was previously overlooked for high-profile signings, when the club were slapped with a transfer ban back in 2019.

The likes of Mason Mount, Tammy Abraham and Reece James all benefitted from the new pathway, and fellow academy graduate Loftus-Cheek is excited for the next generation to come through the ranks.

"Chelsea have always brought through talent and made talent coming through the ranks," says Loftus-Cheek. "For me, maybe I didn't really have anyone to look up to. Other than John Terry, there weren't players coming through from the academy to the first team regularly.

"I didn't have the idol to look up to and see where I could go but now you see the players who have reached the first team and hopefully the boys can see there is a pathway and see it can be done in different ways. You might not just go straight through, you might have to go on loan, but the pathway is there to end up in the Chelsea first team.

"Hopefully we can inspire those boys in the Under-23s and below that it can be done."