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Chelsea Comment: Carlo Ancelotti Vindicated As Blues Avoid Window Shopping
Italian won't be running anywhere naked after his assertions were proved correct...
02-Feb-2010 4:44:00 PM
By Alex Dimond
He said it once, and nobody believed him. So he said it again, and still nobody believed him.
So Carlo Ancelotti upped the stakes, saying he would run around Chelsea’s Cobham training ground naked if the club bought anyone in the January transfer window.
Finally, some started to think that perhaps the Italian manager wasn’t playing games. Yes, the Blues weren’t supposed to miss out on possibly their final opportunity in over a year to add to their ageing squad — but surely no-one, least of all Ancelotti, would want to see the 50-year-old doing a lap of the field in nothing but his birthday suit?
Fortunately, such a damaging sight to eyes and minds has seemingly been averted. As the transfer window feebly swung closed at 5pm yesterday, Chelsea's lack of any last-minute blockbuster signings provided final confirmation that the former AC Milan man wasn’t telling tales after all.
Despite being linked with a number of potentially attractive options, it seems that the west London club — unlike their captain — are true to their word and more than happy with what they already have.
FIFA’s looming one-year (two window) transfer ban didn’t manifestly make January different for Chelsea than any other club. The sort of top players the club would consider signing all would have brought with them inflated prices, and dropping them into the squad at the half-way stage of the season would have brought no guarantee they would adapt quickly, or without upsetting what has been a front-running team spirit.
The down-sides — especially considering Chelsea are so keen to attain self-sufficiency (or as near as possible to it) in the next set of financial results — vastly outweigh the potential benefits.
The first-team’s core might be ageing, but by the summer of 2011 (the next time the club will be able to buy, in a worst-case scenario) only Michael Ballack (33) and Ricardo Carvalho (31) might be considered likely to have a drop-off in their ability. But Ballack is playing more of a defensive role these days, one that requires intelligence more than physical gifts, while Carvalho’s talent has always been in reading the game — something that generally only improves with age.
With Alex (and, in Ballack’s case, Nemanja Matic) waiting in the wings, the club are still well-placed to cope if one or both are no longer able to perform at the highest level twice a week.
Joe Cole’s contract is perhaps the only loose thread that the club have left to chance. In an ideal world both parties would like to have reached an agreement by now, but unfortunately the midfielder’s performances since returning from injury have been average at best — something that, with the club’s new-found financial restraint, isn’t conducive to getting a pay rise.
If the transfer ban is enforced, Cole might still find himself holding the upper-hand in last-ditch discussions. If his recent form is a sign of things to come, he will have no shortage of lucrative offers to consider.
But even if he leaves Stamford Bridge, perhaps Ancelotti believes that, in the likes of Gael Kakuta and the returning Miroslav Stoch (who has been in eye-catching form this season in Holland with FC Twente), he has players capable of stepping up and plugging the gap.
Stoch is not the only long-term loan away from the club this season, with Franco Di Santo (Blackburn Rovers) and Michael Mancienne (Wolverhampton Wanderers) also set to return to the club at the end of the season.
A number of other players from the reserves are also getting experience in the lower leagues or abroad, something Chelsea added to in the window with their only activity, sending Patrick van Aanholt out to Newcastle United and Jack Cork to Burnley (both previously had spent time at Coventry City) until the end of the season. Both will gain a lot from increased exposure to first-team action, and will come back better able to contribute if called upon.
They’ll bolster the ranks of a squad that has already proven itself to be big and strong enough to cope without a number of absentees.
And that is what it comes down to. Ancelotti has not experienced a full-blown injury crisis this season, but he has hardly been lucky with injuries either — in fact, he has never had a full squad to choose from since joining the club — yet he has never had any real problems in coping, such is the array of weapons he can call on. In depth, there are no obvious areas of the squad that need addressing.
The midfield anchor might have been a problem recently — but Deco provided an unlikely short-term solution and John Obi Mikel is back from national service now. With the next African Cup of Nations not for another two years, a similar issue is unlikely to arise until then.
A promising young goalkeeper, Matej Delac, is already pencilled in to arrive as soon as the club's situation with FIFA is resolved. The 17-year-old will add promise and another option to perhaps the only position where there are some mild mid-term concerns (and that is only if Petr Cech's occasional shakiness gradually gets the better of him).
But we are talking about the club's only bit of imminent business being a teenage goalkeeper who, at best, is still five years away from the first-team. The squad is in rude health.
Ancelotti was simply stating the facts all along. It might not have been as exciting or interesting to take him at his word, but it speaks volumes for the club’s faith in their current talent — or their desire to cut costs, or both — that it played out just as he said.
No news is good news, then. Especially as no-one really wanted to see Ancelotti naked, did they?
So Carlo Ancelotti upped the stakes, saying he would run around Chelsea’s Cobham training ground naked if the club bought anyone in the January transfer window.
Finally, some started to think that perhaps the Italian manager wasn’t playing games. Yes, the Blues weren’t supposed to miss out on possibly their final opportunity in over a year to add to their ageing squad — but surely no-one, least of all Ancelotti, would want to see the 50-year-old doing a lap of the field in nothing but his birthday suit?
Fortunately, such a damaging sight to eyes and minds has seemingly been averted. As the transfer window feebly swung closed at 5pm yesterday, Chelsea's lack of any last-minute blockbuster signings provided final confirmation that the former AC Milan man wasn’t telling tales after all.
Despite being linked with a number of potentially attractive options, it seems that the west London club — unlike their captain — are true to their word and more than happy with what they already have.
FIFA’s looming one-year (two window) transfer ban didn’t manifestly make January different for Chelsea than any other club. The sort of top players the club would consider signing all would have brought with them inflated prices, and dropping them into the squad at the half-way stage of the season would have brought no guarantee they would adapt quickly, or without upsetting what has been a front-running team spirit.
The down-sides — especially considering Chelsea are so keen to attain self-sufficiency (or as near as possible to it) in the next set of financial results — vastly outweigh the potential benefits.
The first-team’s core might be ageing, but by the summer of 2011 (the next time the club will be able to buy, in a worst-case scenario) only Michael Ballack (33) and Ricardo Carvalho (31) might be considered likely to have a drop-off in their ability. But Ballack is playing more of a defensive role these days, one that requires intelligence more than physical gifts, while Carvalho’s talent has always been in reading the game — something that generally only improves with age.
With Alex (and, in Ballack’s case, Nemanja Matic) waiting in the wings, the club are still well-placed to cope if one or both are no longer able to perform at the highest level twice a week.
Joe Cole’s contract is perhaps the only loose thread that the club have left to chance. In an ideal world both parties would like to have reached an agreement by now, but unfortunately the midfielder’s performances since returning from injury have been average at best — something that, with the club’s new-found financial restraint, isn’t conducive to getting a pay rise.
If the transfer ban is enforced, Cole might still find himself holding the upper-hand in last-ditch discussions. If his recent form is a sign of things to come, he will have no shortage of lucrative offers to consider.
But even if he leaves Stamford Bridge, perhaps Ancelotti believes that, in the likes of Gael Kakuta and the returning Miroslav Stoch (who has been in eye-catching form this season in Holland with FC Twente), he has players capable of stepping up and plugging the gap.
Stoch is not the only long-term loan away from the club this season, with Franco Di Santo (Blackburn Rovers) and Michael Mancienne (Wolverhampton Wanderers) also set to return to the club at the end of the season.
A number of other players from the reserves are also getting experience in the lower leagues or abroad, something Chelsea added to in the window with their only activity, sending Patrick van Aanholt out to Newcastle United and Jack Cork to Burnley (both previously had spent time at Coventry City) until the end of the season. Both will gain a lot from increased exposure to first-team action, and will come back better able to contribute if called upon.
They’ll bolster the ranks of a squad that has already proven itself to be big and strong enough to cope without a number of absentees.
And that is what it comes down to. Ancelotti has not experienced a full-blown injury crisis this season, but he has hardly been lucky with injuries either — in fact, he has never had a full squad to choose from since joining the club — yet he has never had any real problems in coping, such is the array of weapons he can call on. In depth, there are no obvious areas of the squad that need addressing.
The midfield anchor might have been a problem recently — but Deco provided an unlikely short-term solution and John Obi Mikel is back from national service now. With the next African Cup of Nations not for another two years, a similar issue is unlikely to arise until then.
A promising young goalkeeper, Matej Delac, is already pencilled in to arrive as soon as the club's situation with FIFA is resolved. The 17-year-old will add promise and another option to perhaps the only position where there are some mild mid-term concerns (and that is only if Petr Cech's occasional shakiness gradually gets the better of him).
But we are talking about the club's only bit of imminent business being a teenage goalkeeper who, at best, is still five years away from the first-team. The squad is in rude health.
Ancelotti was simply stating the facts all along. It might not have been as exciting or interesting to take him at his word, but it speaks volumes for the club’s faith in their current talent — or their desire to cut costs, or both — that it played out just as he said.
No news is good news, then. Especially as no-one really wanted to see Ancelotti naked, did they?
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