Ruben Loftus-Cheek sent a firm message to Chelsea fans and his boss Maurizio Sarri in the Europa League match against BATE Borisov last night.
Loftus-Cheek scored an excellent hat-trick for Chelsea on a rare occasion when he was in the starting lineup.
Chelsea managed a 3-1 victory on the night, meaning they've taken the maximum nine points from their first three games against PAOK, Videoton, and BATE Borisov.
UEFA has rewarded Loftus-Cheek for his efforts by giving him the Europa League Player of the Week award.
He was up against Munas Dabbur of RB Salzburg, Giovani Lo Celso of Real Betis, and Michael Frey of Fenerbahce. Dabbur grabbed two goals, Lo Celso got a goal and an assist, and Frey got himself a goal too, but Loftus-Cheek's three trumped them all.
Previous winners of the award this season have been Leo Jaba of PAOK, and Kai Havertz of Bayer Leverkusen.
Loftus-Cheek has played more minutes for England this season than he has in the Premier League. In fact, it's now been 922 days since he last started for Chelsea in the league.
After his hat-trick performance last night, his manager Sarri said that he is 'wonderful' offensively, but says he needs to improve defensively to warrant more playing time.
After his manager's comments, Loftus-Cheek insisted that he still has a strong relationship with Sarri.
It has been suggested that at 22 years of age, Loftus-Cheek must get more starts or begin to look elsewhere for football to further his career. Scoring three goals in European football is no mean feat, and the England international must be drawing interest from other clubs.
While his attacking prowess may not be likened to Blues legend Didier Drogba just yet, his name came up in conversation last night. Loftus-Cheek's hat-trick was the first one for Chelsea in European contribution since Drogba netted three times against Levski Sofia in the Champions League back in 2006.
The Englishman is only the sixth Chelsea player to score a hat-trick in Europe, alongside Drogba, Gianluca Vialli, Tommy Baldwin, Peter Osgood, and Terry Venables.
Stockholm
209
Hatrick! Totally deserved. Sarri better be giving him more minutes now.
Nesaiknruy
205
with dis kante might be starting from d bench..
Kante is never gonna get benched. He is our best midfielder in what he provides. I'd rather have 3 DMs to cover our shaky defensive line than any forward minded CM. Our biggest problem this season is defence and even in his new role Kante still minimises risk...
Nesaiknruy
155
His hold up play and runs are not like a striker's i feel, i like him as an attacking midfielder much better
Exactly. He wouldn't pull off being a striker. His best strengths are to play that Pogba role. All he has to do is work on his passing ability and I think he would surpass Pogba with ease.
Nesaiknruy
112
What a player. Watched him last night. Excellent performance. Hopefully he at least starts coming off the bench and slowly transitions into the team for all games. He added what we were missing last night.