Special Report: Chelsea’s developments before the start of the 2010-11 season
For a club that has won the Premier League title and barely any news was being heard from them in the early parts of the ended season, Stamford Bridge does know how to begin its new season with some noise.
After the end of the season noise of jubilation was all that could have been heard from the club but after the World Cup things have changed a lot. Earlier Michael Essien was injured and he was unable to participate in the World Cup for Ghana and with the signing of Jose Mourinho at Real Madrid and his list of the “Dream Team” featuring many of Chelsea’s featured players; there was not much news coming out from the club.
To top the table from Chelsea on the “Dream Team” list were Ashley Cole, Frank Lampard and Didier Drogba. Jose Mourinho admitted that he had eyes for these players for a long time. The former Inter Milan manager took the job at Bernabeu this summer after Manuel Pellegrini was sacked.
Earlier in the season though Chelsea had acquired the Premier League title they had been knocked out of the Champions League. The Blues got knocked out by the Nerazzurri in the last 16 stage.
After the World Cup things had changed a lot; the defending champions Italy had been knocked out of the competition in the initial stages of the World Cup along with the last time finalists, France. The “Golden Generation” of England had been extremely disappointing too as they were kicked out in the last 16 stage.
This had a direct effect on Chelsea as they have many English International players in their squad and now that their performance had been dismissal, Chelsea who in the early parts of the season were planning to sign in some English players would look like a fool at their approach.
They then refused to renew the contracts of Joe Cole, Michael Ballack and Juliano Belletti. This proved to be a shocker as no one was expecting this move. While Joe Cole had rounded up to a good performance last season and Ballack had been injured in the one of the last matches of Chelsea while playing against Portsmouth. He though had a confounding season as he was part of the star Chelsea team. The 34 year old Juliano Belletti after not getting a nod on his contract has joined the Brazilian club Fluminense.
The 32 year old attacking midfielder Deco is also planning to join Belletti at Fluminense. His contract with Chelsea is about to end and the Brazilian born Portuguese has expressed that he is about to head back home.
Later in a surprise move Joe Cole has joined Liverpool with much persuasion from the Reds skipper Steven Gerrard. Chelsea on the other hand has remained adamant with their strategy of not signing major players this season as they advocate they already have a too good line up. Among the major players signed by them the name Yossi Benayoun seems to be the prominent one.
Michael Ballack on the other hand has joined his former club Bayern Leverkusen from where his fame had actually exploded. After that he went on to join Bayern Munich. Now before the new season starts Chelsea is even planning to go out with some of the players it has.
While the club has renounced claims that they were sending the Ivorian Didier Drogba to Real Madrid sources have revealed that if they are even considering one player on the list they will be considering the whole lot.
News is on the horizon that the Kaka and Cole swap is still on the cards despite earlier claims by the club that they will not be selling their left back defender. Other than that they have just made a bid of 20 million Euros on the new Brazilian prodigy Neymar. It is said that the 18 year old striker, if manages, will have a very bright future at Stamford bridge.
There is bad news falling on them too. Their main goal keeper Petr Cech has injured his calf in a training session and now it seems that he will be out for around 3 to 4 weeks which means that he will be missing the pre season matches and the Community Shield match coming up against Manchester United in about a fort week.
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