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Out of Sight, Out of Mind? What Life Is Like as a Member of Chelsea's Loan Army

He never wore a Chelsea shirt in a competitive match, but in September 2010, Milan Lalkovic got a squad number.

The Slovakian winger was browsing the club website when he discovered that he had been included in a list of players aged 21 or under who were eligible to be called into Chelsea's senior squad during the 2010-11 Premier League season. His squad number, 64, was the highest the club had ever issued.

A quick, two-footed forward, Lalkovic was spotted by Chelsea while playing for Slovakia's under-15s. Chelsea nabbed him from beneath the noses of Manchester City in December 2006, with the teenager feigning illness as a pretext for missing a flight to Manchester and heading to London instead.