Honestly, I do think there's some truth in it, but there's no evidence for it clearly.
I mean the fortnite rumours kinda back it, and the lack of willingness to go out on loan so far too... if he was really working hard in training he'd get a shot, I'd assume, but I dont even hear anything about that - dunno if I've missed something but I've never seen anything about how he's training harder than other players, etc.
Considering where he was 2.5 seasons ago, if he wanted to get back onto that level, I'd expect to see some real fire and desire to break back into the first team, but nothing so far shows that imho