André Villas-Boas and Chelsea’s trickiest task is to rebuild while trying to get the best from the old brigade
André Villas-Boas may be loth to admit it but even eye-catching victories and progress into the Champions League knockout phase generate problems these days. The Portuguese will break away from revelling at having “slapped” down Chelsea’s critics to concentrate on his task of revitalising this club in the weeks ahead. Yet, in the long term, the trickiest obstacle hindering the overhaul of this team may actually prove to be the continued excellence of the old brigade.
The dismissal of Valencia on Tuesday night felt reassuringly familiar. The London side were back at their resilient best, allowing Spanish opponents the ball before hitting hard on the break. Guus Hiddink’s Chelsea might have hoped to have secured a similar result when confronting Barcelona in the 2009 semi-final second leg of this competition but Villas-Boas’s charges, with no dubious refereeing decisions to undermine them, were better rewarded for their efforts. There was strength stiffening the spine of the team and, at its head, a battering ram of a forward who would not be denied.
Didier Drogba, like his fellow forwards Nicolas Anelka and Salomon Kalou, had appeared to be playing out the final days of his Chelsea career with his contract due to expire at the end of this campaign. The club have been in talks over an extension, but the 12 months they have been offering fall short of the two years the Ivorian wants. A lucrative free transfer move to the Middle East has been mooted, offering the 33-year-old one last colossal payday. Yet, if Drogba can reproduce performances as reminiscent of his pomp as that against Valencia on a regular basis over the months to come, then pressure will mount for his services to be retained.
The forward has already contributed 36 goals in 69 Champions League games and believes he should be a part of his club’s future. “I hope I’ve got at least a couple of years left in me,” he said. “I started [playing professionally] late. I was 25 when I played my first Champions League games. Really I don’t know [how long I can carry on playing]. I feel happy, I feel good on the pitch, I really enjoy my football and when we are winning like this I’m really delighted. I don’t calculate. All I want to say is that my future is not so important. When the time comes, we will speak about my future. But at the moment there is no need to.”
Joe Cole and Michael Ballack used to say similar things way back in Carlo Ancelotti’s first season at the club, with the experienced pair eventually leaving under freedom of contract rules in the summer of 2010. But Drogba, whose attitude this term cannot be questioned, still has the ability to make the very idea that he could walk away for nothing in June unthinkable. There had been a hint of a return to his rampaging best in the fixtures leading up to the final group game. The defences of Bayer Leverkusen and Newcastle had been breached, with the brace against the Spanish – with each goal so smartly taken – leaving him a tally of four in as many matches.
There was strength, power and presence to his display on Tuesday, with Adil Rami and Victor Ruiz shrinking in his shadow. Markers bounced off him as he stampeded all over Valencia’s feeble resistance.
The player does not believe he is fully fit, with the perfectionist in him demanding further improvement. “The knock on the head [against Norwich City], the red card [at Queen's Park Rangers], the surgery on my arm [to remove pins applied before the World Cup finals] all didn’t help to get my fitness,” Drogba said. “Now I’m having more games and it’s going to come back. I hope quick, but it is going to come back. I’ve lost a lot of goals and this is something I hope my fitness will help me to improve. When I get to 100% fit there are a few mistakes I will try to rectify.”
Villas-Boas’s dilemma, if he considers it one, is that offering Drogba more than a year may feel rather regressive when everything the Portuguese is hoping to implement at Stamford Bridge is aimed at the long term. Kalou and Anelka will leave, the latter next month with the Chinese club Shanghai Shenhua hoping to see off the new Major League Soccer franchise in Montreal to secure his signature, but the enigma of Fernando Torres’s form still has still to be addressed. Romelu Lukaku may be raw but he, too, will need greater involvement over the next two years. Drogba may actually block the path to progression.
With that in mind, one blazing performance against Valencia is unlikely to dictate the club’s policy over further contract negotiations. Yet should he consistently deliver such explosive displays, along the lines of those mustered en route to the Double two years ago when he scored 37 times, then that stance may shift. The manner of Tuesday’s qualification was a reminder that, while Chelsea continue to adapt to the style Villas-Boas so craves, they can still flourish playing the way they know best. An approach in which Drogba is key.
Didier DrogbaChelseaAndré Villas-BoasDominic Fifieldguardian.co.uk
