Kakuta signs new deal with Chelsea
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Chelsea have ended speculation over the future of Gael Kakuta by announcing the promising forward has signed a new four-and-a-half year deal at the club.
Kakuta was due to leave the Barclays Premier League champions when his contract ran out at the end of the season and the Frenchman had been linked with a move away from Stamford Bridge but he has now committed himself to the club until 2015.
Chelsea were given a two-year transfer ban in September 2009 after being found guilty of inducing Kakuta to break his contract with Lens, but that ban was lifted and the club were cleared of any wrongdoing after the Court of Arbitration for Sport ruled the forward's deal with the French club was not valid.
Chelsea's injury problems and the loss of Joe Cole, Michael Ballack and Deco over the summer have meant the 19-year-old has been deployed nine times by Ancelotti this season.
Ancelotti has earmarked Kakuta, Dutch defender Jeffrey Bruma and English midfielder Josh McEachran as the future of the club and the Lille-born hopeful is glad to have penned a new deal.
"Since I signed for Chelsea when I was 16 all I was thinking about was to get to the first team," Kakuta told Chelsea's official website.
"Now I have been playing a few times with the first team and I have signed for four-and- a-half more years, I have to make a way for myself into the starting 11 and make my dream come true.
"The manager said to me it is the right time to play and I think for me it is as well. It's my job to do my best and try to play more often and show the coach that I am good enough to play in the team."
Kakuta has featured in five of Chelsea's Champions League games so far and is keen to help the Blues' attempts to achieve success both in Europe and domestically, where they have dropped to fourth after a poor run of results.
Kakuta continued: "It is a dream when you are young to play in the Champions League and I hope I will play more games.
"It is always good to play with players with more experience, you learn quicker and to improve quicker is good for our development."
The Blues, meanwhile, insist they have done nothing wrong in their pursuit of Feyenoord youngster Nathan Ake.
The Londoners are understood to have come to an agreement with the Dutch club over the transfer of the 15-year-old, who has also attracted the attention of Manchester City.
The youngster is expected to sign a professional contract at Stamford Bridge when he turns 16 in February - a deal which will see Feyenoord receive compensation set by a tribunal.
Without naming Chelsea specifically, Feyenoord sporting director Leo Beenhakker expressed his dismay at how Premier League clubs are, in his view, taking youngsters from their clubs before their 16th birthday.
"It's driving me crazy that hot prospects are walking away from us like this," Beenhakker told Dutch newspaper Algemeen Dagblad.
"The Premier League clubs spoil the market with their behaviour. Other clubs in Europe aren't doing this kind of things, but the English sides just don't care."
A Chelsea spokesman said the club had been closely working with Feyenoord throughout negotiations with their Dutch counterparts and said everything was above board.
The spokesman said: "We have kept Feyenoord abreast of our interest and as such we have reached an agreement with them."
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