Lampard confident in Ancelotti's Chelsea
Chelsea midfielder Frank Lampard has expressed confidence in his team's ability and the tactics chosen by manager Carlo Ancelotti.
Lampard has been left out of the England team that faces Bulgaria on Friday after he underwent hernia surgery this week. The midfielder is expected to return for Chelsea's first Champions League fixture against MSK Zilina in just under two weeks' time.
Squad continuity
Speaking to the club's official website, Lampard said he was happy that the current Chelsea squad is relatively unchanged from the team that won the Premier League and the FA Cup last season.
"'Continuity is nice, especially when you have won a Double but you do want to add to it and make it better although at the same time you don't want to add to it and make it worse."
During the summer, the club saw the departures of Ricardo Carvalho, Scott Sinclair and Joe Cole, with Franco Di Santo and Michael Mancienne leaving on loan deals, while Yossi Benayoun arrived from Liverpool.
This year's transfer activity was restrained when compared to the spending spree that followed Roman Abramovich's 2003 takeover of the club.
4-3-3 the way to go
In the interview, Lampard also explained that he preferred playing with only one holding midfielder, despite the popularity of of the 4-2-3-1 formation, which employs two midfielders in front of the defensive line.
"It depends on the individuals in the team," he said. "If the manager wants to get the best out of wingers or players who like to play with a lot of freedom and think they need two others in there to do the hard work and stay back then so be it, but when we had [Claude] Makelele he didn't particularly need anyone to be next to him, he did the job perfectly and we worked all around that."
Since Jose Mourinho introduced the 4-3-3 formation at Chelsea in 2004, Lampard has thrived as one of two attacking midfielders in the starting team. He said he was grateful that the winning formation has not been altered by Ancelotti, who arrived at Stamford Bridge last year.
Chelsea are currently in first place in the league, having collected three straight wins with an impressive goal difference of 14–0.
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