As Chelsea continue along their short term road of ‘hire and fire‘, the next four weeks could see Chelsea’s season being destroyed by three former employees; two of which have a point to prove.
Chelsea visit Watford this Saturday for a Fifth Round FA Cup match. Watford are now managed by former Youth Team Coach at Stamford Bridge, Brendan Rodgers.
The following Saturday sees Chelsea fight for a Champions League qualification place when they visit ‘new kids on the block‘, Aston Villa. This could be one of the most important games in Chelsea’s season. So they will not be looking forward to the following two games against Juventus and the return of Claudio Ranieri.
Ranieri was badly treated by Chelsea. As soon as Roman Abramovich & Peter Kenyon arrived at Stamford Bridge they began plans to replace Claudio Ranieri with Porto manager, Jose Mourinho.
Though Ranieri made tactical errors, most notably in the UEFA Champions League against a weakened Monaco, it is often forgotten that Chelsea finished second in the Premier League in Claudio Ranieri’s final season; and would have won the Premiership title that year if it wasn’t for Arsenal setting a new record of playing the whole season without losing a game.
Ranieri is currently locked in a Serie A title fight with Jose Mourinho’s Inter Milan, and I’m sure would love to give Peter Kenyon & Roman Abramovich a payback grin if Juventus were to knock Chelsea out of the UEFA Champions League.
Furthermore, in between the two games against Juventus, Chelsea travel to Fratton Park where Avram Grant
may well be the manager of Portsmouth.
Avram Grant, like Claudio Ranieri before him, was badly treated by Chelsea in knowing that his departure had been pre-arranged even before Chelsea kicked a ball in the 2008 UEFA Champions League Final, which they eventually lost to Manchester United on penalties.
As I write this I hear that the Russian Football Union have granted permission for the Russia football manager Guus Hiddink to hold talks with Chelsea. As Roman Abramovich reportedly pays Guus Hiddink’s wage already, I can’t imagine anyone is going to stop Hoodink becoming the next Chelsea manager.
Guus Hiddink has the last laugh
Hiddink has stated today, he is only interersted in taking the job on a short term basis. You don’t think he’s taking the piss do you? The last person to be Chelsea manager on a long term basis was Dave Sexton!
1 comment so far
1 Caleb // Feb 11, 2009 at 3:29 am
Another great post mate! What a scary job that is as a manager. Guus could do it though, he is an awesome coach.