• Chelsea goalkeeper admits not being able to stand up
• Collision recalls 2006 collision with Stephen Hunt

Petr Cech has revealed he was so dazed after the head injury he suffered against Fulham in the Carling Cup last Wednesday that he could not stand up at half-time, as memories inevitably went back to his infamous collision with the then Reading midfielder Stephen Hunt in 2006.

The Chelsea goalkeeper, who has worn a protective helmet ever since the clash with Hunt, collided with Fulham’s Orlando Sá just before the interval of the third-round tie at Stamford Bridge, which Chelsea won on penalties. He was able to carry on until half-time but, once inside the dressing room, his vision became scrambled and he was taken straight to hospital. Happily for Cech, the scan revealed nothing more serious than concussion and he was permitted to train on Friday and play in Saturday’s Premier League victory over Swansea City.

“My head was shaken,” he said. “I could feel it but when I stood up [after the collision], I was fine. At that point, I was absolutely fine. But at half-time, as soon as I sat down, I couldn’t stand up. I went to hospital and had a scan. With my history, they were not taking any chances, although the procedure is the same with any player who has concussion, just to make sure that nothing is happening inside.

“When I came inside to the dressing room, I couldn’t see properly and I didn’t have the awareness of the space. It was clear that my head wasn’t working the way it should. It was more the emotion because my head went back like when you get a right hook in boxing. I don’t know what happened. I think the helmet took most of the impact. I thought I would be OK … I just didn’t know if I would be ready to play [against Swansea].

“My wife just said that, luckily, she didn’t see it because every time something happens like that, it reminds her of 2006. Luckily, she didn’t see the game. She was looking after the kids.”

Cech and the Chelsea medical staff left it until the last moment to discover whether he was fit for Swansea, when the warm-up served as a late test. But he said that despite the latest knock, his confidence remained undimmed.

“When I played again after my first injury, I said if I need to put my head somewhere, I will do it,” Cech said. “It’s part of the game. One day, if I feel the fear of putting my head in the middle of some battle or scrum, then I stop. But so far, I haven’t felt that.

“Let’s put it right. It would have been stupid of me to play [against Swansea] if I was not right. You can make a mistake that will cost your team-mates a game. So I had full awareness of what was at stake, I was fine and I decided to play.”

ChelseaDavid Hytnerguardian.co.uk

André Villas-Boas knows nothing but winning will do and Roman Abramovich will want the Champions League

The club

We are Chelsea

They want to develop a globally recognised brand providing customers and sponsors with high-level football-based content going forward. (Translation: The Manchester City of the south.)

Bonus culture or EU bailout? They have taken full advantage of the Premier League’s “Financial Unfair Play” rules by spending £71m on Fernando Torres and David Luiz in January and financing another splurge this summer – not forgetting £13.2m on a new manager. Bonuses and Baby Bentleys all round!

They’d bite your hand off if you offered them …

The Champions League. There’s been a space cleared on the mantelpiece for eight years now. It was all meant to come together on a night in Moscow but since that cruel jilting the club’s owner has haunted that cobweb-strewn corner of Chelsea’s trophy room like a designer-stubbled Miss Havisham mourning her lost love.

Reality check

Ten months of lazy references to José Mourinho followed by Premier League’s youngest and most expensive managerial sacking.

What the fans sing

If she don’t come/I’ll tickle her bum/With a lump of celery/Celery! Celery!

What the fans should sing

Please, Please, Please, Let Me Get What I Want (The Smiths)

One to follow on Twitter

Florent Malouda is @realflorentm

“It was goof to share a good time with Surinam ghetto youth. We have Chelsea fans everywhere!!!”

The players

This is England

John Terry, Ashley Cole, Frank Lampard are all experienced hate figures at international level. Lampard, in particular, must have read more obituaries for his international career than Tiger Woods has had hot cocktail waitresses but, like the Dude, he abides.

Overseas aid

Toothy pint-sized urchin Ramires had a difficult baptism in a makeshift midfield, but has since shown the sort of form that makes him a regular for Brazil. Paulo Ferreira is the most successful full-back in Chelsea’s history but his name on the teamsheet these days is greeted with groans and cries of “Is he still here?”

Heart and soul or captain caveman?

Terry is now routinely painted as the overmighty employee who thinks he is bigger than the club but no one was complaining about player power when he led the team to three league titles, three FA Cups and two League Cups, regularly sticking his head where Arjen Robben wouldn’t put his agent’s feet. The manager says he represents “the history of Chelsea”. That’s a compliment, right?

Teenage kicks

Oxford-born Josh McEachran made his debut in the Champions League last September. This season the left-footed midfielder will hope to establish himself much as Jack Wilshere has done at Arsenal. The best youth team graduate since John Terry in the last century.

Mad, bad and dangerous to know

Didier Drogba, having seen off the challenges of Andriy Shevchenko, Hernán Crespo and Nicolas Anelka, has probably scent-marked Fernando Torres’s peg at Cobham. Even at 33 he seems determined to occupy the crease, leaving the forlorn Iberian waif stranded at the non-striker’s end.

The manager

Paid the cost to be the boss

Leaving Mourinho’s back room to join Académica mid-season he lifted the club from bottom of the Portuguese league to mid-table. Next season he led Porto to a league, cup and European treble. A long way from his first job, in which he oversaw the British Virgin Islands’ 14-1 aggregate World Cup defeat to Bermuda.

Clogger or tiki-taka?

His successful Porto team tended to play an attacking 4-3-3. “It is not just a question of winning, it is a question of winning with a certain amount of flair. We are proud defenders of the beauty of the game, it makes no sense for us to get into a club like this and play dreadful football,” he argued.

On his to-do list

As the first Chelsea manager born after the release of the Clash’s first album he needed to stamp his authority on the club fast – and asserted complete control by sacking backroom staff and cancelling a prestige friendly. After that it’s just a case of winning. With style. Oh, and keeping Roman sweet.

The advice Sepp Blatter might give to your club

“We give Russia the World Cup and what he do? He sack Butch Wilkins. Discrimination against shortie bald men is unacceptable. ‘Stay on your feet,’ says kind Butch. But for this I will not stand.”

Rule change

Make them stick with manager three years minimum. Tie-hating bigwig gets bored and skedaddleski.

ChelseaPremier Leagueguardian.co.uk

• Club await results of scans after midfielder hurt in training
• Damaged knee is same one that kept him out of World Cup

Chelsea are braced to be without Michael Essien for the majority of the forthcoming campaign as the Premier League club continue to scrutinise the severe knee ligament damage sustained by the Ghana midfielder on the first full day of pre-season training.

Essien twisted after landing awkwardly last Thursday – the first day of double sessions since the first-team squad returned to Cobham – and, with the swelling on his right knee having receded slightly, has since undergone a series of scans on the joint. Chelsea are expected to release a statement once the results of the medical scans and checks have been assessed, but there is a sense of pessimism surrounding his prospects of playing any football until well into the new year.

The Ghanaian managed 43 appearances last season, despite rarely displaying his previous dynamism, which had been considered encouraging given he had suffered serious injuries to both knees in recent seasons. He was ruled out for more than six months from September 2008 after rupturing the anterior cruciate ligament in his right knee while playing for Ghana, and subsequently missed around seven months last year after tearing the medial ligament in his left knee while training ahead of the African Cup of Nations.

That injury kept him out of the summer’s World Cup finals and, having suffered complications, required four operations to repair the damage, with the possibility of surgery again now being explored to repair the latest injury. Given the history of problems in the joints, there are inevitably concerns over whether he will ever return to being the explosive, energetic player who cost Chelsea £24.4m from Lyon in 2005. Regardless, another lengthy period of rehabilitation now awaits before any assessment can be made on his future prospects of returning to competitive action.

The midfielder’s anticipated and prolonged absence could yet force André Villas-Boas to enter the transfer market for a direct replacement.