Big Des Says

[BridgeMonkee]

Chelsea captain Marcel Desailly has warned fans that the team is "not ready yet" and admits he must "set an example" to improve the defence.
(Might be an improvement IF we started with Terry and Gallas?)

Desailly is about to enter his fifth season at Stamford Bridge, having been signed by former boss Gianluca Vialli for £4.6m from AC Milan in August 1998.
(Fair play to him, that he never quit chelsea and he could have done)

"This could be a great season for Chelsea," said the 33-year-old France international. "But then we keep saying 'we could be great' and 'we can be great'.
"We've had great moments - like going on nine-game runs. And, yes, we've done well, but we still do not have the overall consistency.
"We're not ready yet. We're only sometimes like a good team but we do not have enough about ourselves - individually or collectively - to get out of trouble.
"This is the main thing because, if we had that, we could be one of the best teams in the league."
In fact, Desailly believes the manager who signed him for Chelsea produced a better side than current incumbent Claudio Ranieri.

"The team under Vialli were more ready to cope when they were in trouble, to analyse the game and come through it," added the skipper in an interview with the club's TV channel.
"Now, although we have more quality, we're a bit crazy. We're not able to analyse the moment. We're not able to slow down and keep what we have in our pockets.
"Maybe some of the lower opposition know from our history that if they are ready to play hard against us, they can beat us. The bigger teams wait for us to come at them and match us."

(Vialli! Vialli! Vialli!...)

http://www.teamtalk.com/teamtalk/Team_News/0,1562,14,00.html

[ATL Blue One]

Where is Luca now?

[BridgeCowboy]

After his sacking from Watford, I believe it was reported that he was going to return to Italy to coach. Can't say I know where though....


I'm sure a piece of his heart still resides at the Bridge.

[BridgeCowboy]

His departure from Watford was pretty harsh, he hardly had time to build his squad. But as it always is, there were too few victories and too much money spent

[BridgeMonkee]

There was a wonderful swagger in the step of the players in the Vialli years. Wise. DiMatteo and Lucca - Poyet, etc - Ruudey brought it all together really, and Hoddle laid the foundation, but Vialli put the swagger in the team - an arrogance, a belief..yeah they were a flash team, but they were enjoying their football, IF only they had had Jimmy Golden boots instead of Sutton who knows what they might have achieved eh?
Ho-hum.

Vialli was sacked and DiMatteo broke his leg and everything came tumbling down.

Vialli is a great charactor - a star - a diamond geezer - he'll shine again.

[BridgeMonkee]

He lowered the age of the team and got us in the FA Cup final - Ordinarily reaching the cup final is a pretty decent achievement for any coach. I just felt that deep down before last years cup final, that we didn’t have a realistic chance – under Vialli yer just ignored those kind of feelings, yer always fancied your chances.

[Clan]

Gaffe #2 for the Cap.
First it was "i didn't always try" and now it's "Ranieris lot aren't as good as Vialli's"

Something not right with the big mans "professionalism" here fellas.
Even if it were true about the teams, you simply don't state that in public and embaress the gaffer like that.
If that was Sir Alex Dessailly would never make it out of pre season in blue.

I personally think the last statement is spot on.

I also hope Terry doesn't get any serious time in the nick as this could very well be dessailly's last year around.
I still remember how both he and Le Bouef were toyed with at the WC.

http://chelsea.rivals.net/default.asp?sid=884&p=2&stid=8268748