Joe Cole and Rio Ferdinand have both agreed that Cole Palmer has to be the ‘signing of the season’.
The 21-year-old joined Chelsea in a deal worth £42.5million on transfer deadline.
It looked a bogus fee for a player who had only made 19 appearances in the English top flight for Manchester City.
However, Cole Palmer has gone on to be not only Chelsea’s best player but one of the best in the league this season.
Palmer has scored 19 goals in all competitions this term. He has also racked up eight assists in the league, with only five players bettering his total.
For Joe Cole and Rio Ferdinand, Cole Palmer is indeed the signing of the season.
“I said it [that Palmer is the signing of the season] after the game in the height of excitement and I’m sober today and I still think it… I think so,” Cole told TNT Sports.
“I can’t see an argument against, for the money Chelsea paid for him and the age he’s at and what he’s done for Chelsea.
“I shudder to think where Chelsea would be if Cole Palmer hadn’t put pen to paper. He’s been that good, he really has.
“There have been three or four or five players at the club that I think have done well this year, but he’s been outstanding. He really has.”
Cole added: “With that mindset, he has to go with England because you know when you’re putting him on the pitch in any type of game at the Euros and it’s not going to faze him.
“We’ve seen players who have fallen to bits at those pressure moments and that will never happen to him.”
Rio Ferdinand also said of Cole Palmer: “Yeah, I think he has to be [the signing of the season].
“[Alexis] Mac Allister has put in a case towards now. He scored a great goal the other day.
“At the business end of the season, he has come to the fore.
“But I think if you look at the numbers this kid [Palmer] has put up, he’s a young boy as well.
“The biggest compliment I can give him is that Cole Palmer seems like the kid who will go anywhere in the world, in the biggest stadiums in the world, and it will feel to him like he’s just going down goals in his local area with his mates.
“He scored a hat-trick the other day. After the game, me and him [Cole] are standing there going, ‘How is he so calm?’, it’s unreal.”