Hazard drops Real Madrid move hint

For him to arrive at the Santiago Bernabeu, he would have to request a transfer to his club, and that could surely happen if things don’t get better for him before the end of the season.

But as the wheels have gradually loosened and dropped off Chelsea’s 2015/16 campaign, and with it Jose Mourinho’s grip on the dressing room, the Hazard rumours have gathered to such a pace that they now appear a significant issue for the Blues. “More importantly we’ve still got the best manager in the world”, he told ChelseaTV this week.

Ramsey, 24, came off during the second half of Arsenal’s 2-0 Champions League win over Bayern Munich. But I’ve got no sympathy for [Hazard] in the sense that the question mark hanging over him is in respect of ‘can he go to that next, next level?’

Hazard’s potential move from Chelsea to the city of Madrid has been mooted in this space before, along with talk of Atlético’s Antoine Griezmann going the other way.

It has been speculated that the forward does not enjoy the best of relationships with Mourinho.

“What hasn’t helped him is Chelsea have been conceding goals that they don’t normally do”.

“At the weekend [Mourinho] played Willian and Pedro in those roles, who are more willing to come back”. It’s more what they’re about as wide players.

And he thinks the team is growing in confidence after keeping their second consecutive clean sheet. Even though there hasn’t been any private statement, private sources for the Telegraph have said Wilmots believes that this loss of form has a lot to do with the fact that Mourinho is making him do far too much.

“The conversations I can have with the players stay between us, but in this case I felt obliged to react”, he said in a statement carried by RTBF.