I do worry about where the real personalities of the team are," Lampard told the Daily Mail.

"To be a big team, you have to have big personalities. I don't want to sound like I am harking back to the days of me and John and Ashley Cole and Petr Cech and Didier Drogba but I do see a team now where John is the last mainstay of that identity.

"We had a fantastic spirit at Chelsea. We are kind of famous for it now. People criticised us for it to try to take away the gloss of what we were doing. 

"Maybe Chelsea are looking for a more beautiful way now. 

"The club has been trying to push it down that route with the players they have recruited over the last four or five years."

"The problem is if you fall in the middle, somewhere between tough and beautiful. 

"It's nice football at times but it's not that nice and it's not really winning games. It's not beautiful, beautiful stuff. 

"They need to buy two or three big players. Because being 11th in the Premier League is ridiculous for Chelsea."

 

I think he's spot on. The character we used to have has been dismantled over the last few seasons and that's what we're paying the price for now. If one of our greatest ever players can see that then hopefully the board can too.

 

But I wonder if the AVB situation in 2012 and the rumours of 'player power' made Roman want a more docile squad because we don't seem to have any real leaders in the squad except JT, and now he's being let go.

 

But as fans, isn't it these types of players we gravitate towards? Aren't these the ones we celebrate? Where does the next generation of these players come from?

Whilst his concern's are completely valid, the only thing I will say is that barring Terry and possibly some staff members, how much knowledge of behind the scenes stuff does he have now (obviously more than me/the fans)? He left before having a chance to work with Courtois, Fabregas, Zouma etc so just remember everything here is him making an educated guess. Having said that I can't wait till him and Drogba come back in some capacity, maybe do a few one-on-one lessons with RLC to replicate that goal scoring threat from midfield.

Considering that he's a good friend of JT I'm sure they are still in touch and Frank's pretty much up to date with what's happening. At least more so than any journo or twitter personality out there.

I think he is right to be concerned. BUT a man like JT can be intimidating to some players as well. They feel he is still the man in the house and do don't have the balls to step up.

Interesting comment about falling between tough and beautiful. If you don't get either right, you become Arsenal.

It's nice to see we still have the hunger and fight to come back into a game like we did vs southampton. that to me shows maybe we can do it without the big personalities, because a few months ago vs southampton i don't see us getting back into that game. it was only a glimpse, but seeing as terry wasn't even on the pitch i think that shows the lads have that oomph about them, but we just need to keep showing that resilience for the remainder of the season. 

Our greatest ever team in my opinion is the one that faced United in the 2008 Champions League Final.

 

That team had Cech, Essien, Carvalho, Terry, Cole, Makelele, Ballack, Lampard, Cole, Malouda and Drogba starting.

 

Now that team to me has 9 players I'd consider leaders (sorry Joe and Florent). In fact most of them were captains of club or country. 

 

That's what we don't have anymore. Men. Leaders. Battlers (not bottlers, we have those still). I don't know if we've bought a player in the last five years who fits into that group. Maybe Costa or Fabregas? That is what I think Frank means, that in the quest to be 'beautiful' we've forgotten what made us successful over a long period of time.

I almost stopped reading after the bit where it said  " Lampard told the Daily Mail "  The Daily Mail ffs ?

 

Unfortunately I read a bit further when he went on to say  " I don't want to sound like I am harking back to the days of me and John and Ashley Cole and Petr Cech and Didier Drogba but ....."

 

Well actually Frank, it seems to me that's exactly what you are doing.

 

Don't get me wrong, I think Lampard was absolutely exceptional during his career with us, but come on Frank you were well rewarded financially so please don't have a cheap pop via a scummy rag.

Our greatest ever team in my opinion is the one that faced United in the 2008 Champions League Final.

 

That team had Cech, Essien, Carvalho, Terry, Cole, Makelele, Ballack, Lampard, Cole, Malouda and Drogba starting.

 

Now that team to me has 9 players I'd consider leaders (sorry Joe and Florent). In fact most of them were captains of club or country. 

 

That's what we don't have anymore. Men. Leaders. Battlers (not bottlers, we have those still). I don't know if we've bought a player in the last five years who fits into that group. Maybe Costa or Fabregas? That is what I think Frank means, that in the quest to be 'beautiful' we've forgotten what made us successful over a long period of time.

 

You are confusing greatness with leadership. Only 5 of those i'd consider leaders.

 

I bet you didn't think we lacked leaders and only had bottlers 9 months ago!?! You come across terribly whingy and immature in a lot of your posts if I can be honest with you. You seem to be like a lot of Chelsea and United fans recently in that opinions have totally switched on almost everything over a relatively short period of time because of a period of struggle.

 

As Jose would say "you go with the wind".

Sounds like he thinks because we won that way for all that time, that's the only way you can win, with numerous big personalities.

Do Barca have them? I'd say none since Puyol and Xavi moved on. Messi Neymar, Iniesta Suarez are all world class talent but I wouldn't call them huge personalities.

I'd take talent and top coaching over a team of personalities.

Somebody above said we don't want to become Arsenal. Well we don't want to become Stoke either.

You are confusing greatness with leadership. Only 5 of those i'd consider leaders.

 

 

So I was only confusing greatness with leadership 4 times? That's not too bad is it?

 

I'll take a guess you're excluding Cole, Makelele, Essien and Carvalho? OK. I disagree but I respect your point. Five leaders throughout the spine of a team is still remarkably special.

 

 

 

I bet you didn't think we lacked leaders and only had bottlers 9 months ago!?! 

 

Now I'm gutted you didn't let me put money on this bet. I thought we were lacking leaders probably 13 months ago and after we let Cech and Drogba go without replacing them (as leaders) it was very clear that we were in a bit of trouble.

 

You come across terribly whingy and immature in a lot of your posts if I can be honest with you. You seem to be like a lot of Chelsea and United fans recently in that opinions have totally switched on almost everything over a relatively short period of time because of a period of struggle.

 

 

Whingeing? Yeah I can see that. Immature? OK, although spending so much time caring about a football team is intrinsically immature although I'd say irrational, maybe naive. As a follower of my posts though I thought I'd made it clear that my issues with the club aren't recent. Sorry if I haven't made that clear amongst the whingeing but this isn't just about this season. If it was then we wouldn't be talking about us making the same mistakes.

Our greatest ever team in my opinion is the one that faced United in the 2008 Champions League Final.

 

That team had Cech, Essien, Carvalho, Terry, Cole, Makelele, Ballack, Lampard, Cole, Malouda and Drogba starting.

 

Now that team to me has 9 players I'd consider leaders (sorry Joe and Florent). In fact most of them were captains of club or country. 

 

That's what we don't have anymore. Men. Leaders. Battlers (not bottlers, we have those still). I don't know if we've bought a player in the last five years who fits into that group. Maybe Costa or Fabregas? That is what I think Frank means, that in the quest to be 'beautiful' we've forgotten what made us successful over a long period of time.

 

Did you say the same thing after Drogba's antics in the final?

Did you say the same thing after Drogba's antics in the final?

 

Did I take one incident in a player's career and use it to define them? No. Didn't do that at the Camp Nou in 2012 either. Why do you ask?

Of course he’s worried, deep down most of us are I’d imagine. We have moved one all but one of the team from the last decade but it had to happen sooner or later.

How many leaders do teams around us have like we used to? I don’t think very many. Guys like Tibo and Azpi are young enough and experienced enough to become leaders long term for us while you would think Cesc is there just now and you saw that with Hazard after the City game.

Losing John would be crazy since his experience, quality and influence is absolutely key, we must keep him next season…no ifs or buts.

On the topic of leaders, I think a lot of it comes down to a substantial change in modern football over the last couple of years. When you look back to the mid-late 2000's and before, every team had massive characters in it. We had Ballack, Lampard, Cole, Cech and Drogba, United had Scholes, Giggs, Rooney, Keane, Vidic, Rio and of course Ferguson, Arsenal had Viera, Lehmann etc, Barcelona had Puyol and Xavi, among others, and the big Italian and German teams had huge leaders of their own. Now when I look around, there's very few players that carry that same level of personality and leadership. United are left with Rooney, We're left with Terry, Arsenal have no one except Cech, even Barcelona, Real Madrid and Bayern are seriously lacking in those big personalities, and I think that's just the way modern football has gone. The players who played with real selfless passion and desire for the team are dying out in favour of largely selfish, mercenary footballers. How many big leaders are left in modern football really? Juventus have a few of them, Kompany is one that springs to mind in the Premiership, but they're not as common as they used to be, and I think that's a lot to do with players now seeing football as a monetary career, there's so little loyalty from players to their clubs and fans that being a big personality and leader in a team is becoming a thing of the past. This, more than anything, is why I want to see our academy products prosper with us, because coming up through the ranks is naturally going to inspire loyalty to the club, fans team, and subsequently breed passion and character. Compare that with a journeyman player like Zlatan, or others, who float from club to club for massive paycheques, of course they're not going to play for the team, they play for themselves. 

I'd kill for some real big characters to come back into football, it's desperately needed

I think we proved against Southampton we have leaders, someone/something found the wherewithal to search deep and produce a fantastic result. Cesc looks the leader with Brana...

Whilst his concern's are completely valid, the only thing I will say is that barring Terry and possibly some staff members, how much knowledge of behind the scenes stuff does he have now (obviously more than me/the fans)? He left before having a chance to work with Courtois, Fabregas, Zouma etc so just remember everything here is him making an educated guess. Having said that I can't wait till him and Drogba come back in some capacity, maybe do a few one-on-one lessons with RLC to replicate that goal scoring threat from midfield.

 

He's probably formed his opinion on what we have all seen on the pitch on match day, and that is the best time to see the real side of a football team. What we have seen is players not giving everything they have for the team and no leaders looking to drag us out of a huge mess. Yeah, a few of them are stepping up now, but it's too late, we needed them when Mourinho was fighting for his job.

I think we proved against Southampton we have leaders, someone/something found the wherewithal to search deep and produce a fantastic result. Cesc looks the leader with Brana...

I'd agree there, I think (as i've been saying for a while) Cesc should be our captain if JT does leave in the summer

Did you say the same thing after Drogba's antics in the final?

The one where Drogba scored the header to put it into ET and then scored the winning penalty..... No, probably not.

 

Or have you forgotten that you're speaking about a man whose scored in so many cup finals that they should name a f**king award after him?

 

Its funny that you single out Drogba. Probably the worst person you could go after for leadership considering his on and off the field examples (oh, hospital building, being named one of the worlds 100 Most Influential People by People Magazine, you know that whole stopping a civil war thing LOL).

 

What next, lets try and belittle Lampard's goal scoring record?

Wouldn't let me edit. 

 

I will concede that Drogba's leadership improved with age and that he made mistakes, as all do.  I don't feel any Chelsea fan has a leg to stand on when it comes to attacking his leadership given the context of his whole career here and very hopefully  in an important role in the future.

slag off SFL & the Drog, 

 

why be a Chelsea fan then?

A few interesting thoughts (albeit focused on Arsenal) from Michael Cox about the oft-repeated argument that the current batch of Premier League sides is lacking leaders:

 

http://www.espnfc.com/barclays-premier-league/23/blog/post/2818906/arsenal-criticism-for-lack-of-leaders-is-missing-the-point

A few interesting thoughts (albeit focused on Arsenal) from Michael Cox about the oft-repeated argument that the current batch of Premier League sides is lacking leaders:

 

http://www.espnfc.com/barclays-premier-league/23/blog/post/2818906/arsenal-criticism-for-lack-of-leaders-is-missing-the-point

 

Michael Cox is a man who focusses on the tactical side of the game, rather well I might add, but I think he completely ignores the mental aspect of the game and that's not uncommon. He also seems to view leadership in one particular way.

 

For me, leadership isn't just about rallying the troops with a few carefully chosen words although that can work. 

 

What it's about is being the guy who takes responsibility for a moment in the game. It's about putting your hand up and saying 'I've got this' and that's what's lacking in our team (and Arsenal's). Funnily enough both teams had people who did that last season in Sanchez and Hazard, and it was Hazard's willingness to do this in key moments especially in the second-half of the season that probably decided the title. 

 

What's worrying now is that he's not doing that. He's in a run of poor form and rather than putting his hand up and looking for responsibility he's actively avoiding those instances.

 

Players like Lampard and Drogba didn't just step-up in those moments, they thrived in those moments. Drogba was the archetypal 'big-game' player, the man who put his hand up when the biggest moment in this club's history arrived. How many times did Lampard pick the ball up in a match at 0-0 and take it upon himself to hit the ball from 30 yards? Even Ashley Cole was a clutch penalty-taker for us. 

 

That's what I think of when we talk about leaders and I think right now the only players we have in that mould are Fabregas and maybe Costa. Cesc got the Arsenal armband at 20 I think, and in recent weeks he's been the one to go looking for the ball. Willian was doing that earlier in the season as well. But it's got to be consistent over the course of seasons and it's these players with high character that I think we've avoided buying in recent years.

 

Maybe that type of player isn't attractive enough, maybe it's a coincidence or maybe it's because these were the players who AVB had such issues with. Maybe Roman hasn't forgotten that. Who knows? Maybe 'Millennials' are just a crummy generation who avoid real responsibility or maybe these players are just given too much too young. But the great teams will always have players who will shoulder the burden of expectation when it's at it's highest and we're about to let the last truly great one that this club has leave.