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This is absolutely disgraceful from Abramovich. RDM wins CL and FA cup for Chelsea and this is how they repay him?
Represented Chelsea both as player and Coach.
Utterly disrespectful. I hope Guardiola steers well clear otherwise his reputation will be fatally damaged.
Abram wants to win it in style and make Chelsea a dominant team in Europe. Everyone knows that Chelsea's victory in CL last season was written in the stars, much like the way Man U won a few moons ago. Above all he wants to bring Barca's tiki taka football to Stamford Bridge which means that players have to be groomed and cultured at their youth academy.
So only two managers fit in-one is Pep the other is Wenger.
Gullit: If you win something at Chelsea you get sacked
The Dutchman has hit out at his former club for dismissing Roberto Di Matteo and suggests that the west London outfit have Jose Mourinho lined up for a return
Nov 21, 2012 2:37:00 PM
By Tom J Doyle
Former Chelsea manager Ruud Gullit has expressed his dismay at the dismissal of Roberto Di Matteo.
The 42-year-old was given his marching orders on Wednesday morning after a 3-0 defeat to Juventus left the Blues' European hopes hanging by a thread.
But the Dutchman believes Roman Abramovich was wrong to sack the former Italy international, due to his FA Cup and Champions League successes last term.
"If you win something at Chelsea you get sacked. If you don't win you can stay for a long time," he told Sky Sports News.
"It's sad for Robbie. He hasn't even been there a year in charge. It's unbelievable, but it's part of being a coach.
"I already had a very good feeling when he won the Champions League maybe they had somebody else in the frame, but I don't think they took any notice of the fact that Robbie could win it."
Gullit went on to claim that the Chelsea hierarchy may have already lined up a return to Stamford Bridge for Real Madrid boss Jose Mourinho.
He continued: "I always had the feeling Mourinho was in the frame because he signed his contract with Real Madrid just after Chelsea won the Champions League.
"His record says everything - a lot of people would love to see him in England."
The former Netherlands international also criticised the club's board for attempting to emulate Barcelona, insisting the Catalan giants are unique in football.
"We thought the main thing for Chelsea was to win the Champions League, but they still sacked the manager," he added.
"The board wants to play the same sort of football as Barcelona, but Barcelona is Barcelona.
"They want to copy something that you can't - and Barcelona have Messi. Don't put away your own identity, because sometimes you can't copy something."
Gullit also dismissed any potential return to Stamford Bridge for himself, saying: "I'm busy with my own things. I wouldn't feel comfortable to come after Robbie because he's a very good friend of mine."
The 52-year-old former Liverpool and Inter manager takes charge of the Blues until the end of the season following the sacking of Roberto Di Matteo on Wednesday morning
Nov 21, 2012 7:32:00 PM
By Jay Jaffa
Rafael Benitez has been confirmed as Chelsea's new manager, after the club sacked Roberto Di Matteo in the aftermath of Tuesday's 3-0 Champions League defeat to Juventus.
The 52-year-old takes charge of the European champions on an interim basis until the end of the current campaign after spending almost two years out of work following his dismissal at Inter.
A statement on the club's official website read: "The owner and the Board believe that in Benitez we have a manager with significant experience at the highest level of football, who can come in and immediately help deliver our objectives.
"The 52-year-old Spaniard is due to meet the players at the training ground in Cobham tomorrow [Thursday]."
Benitez will take charge of his second Premier League club after a successful six-year spell at Liverpool between 2004 and 2010.
His time on Merseyside led to success in Europe as he won the club's fifth European Cup in his second season in 2005, while he also secured the FA Cup a year later.
Roman Abramovich relieved Di Matteo of his duties on Wednesday morning despite the Italian guiding the club to their maiden Champions League trophy and a seventh FA Cup last season.
Di Matteo signed a two-year deal in the summer, but has seen his position questioned almost continually since with Pep Guardiola thought to wanted by the Russian oligarch to lead the club.
Benitez becomes the ninth Blues manager in nine years in the Abramovich era.
Benitez appointment leaves Chelsea fans furious with out-of-touch club
The former Liverpool boss is the antithesis of what Blues followers want from a manager, while supporters remain furious over the treatment of club legend Roberto Di Matteo
Nov 21, 2012 8:00:00 PM
COMMENT
By Dan Levene | Blues Chronicle
Chelsea fans were already in uproar at the sacking of Roberto Di Matteo, just six months after winning the Champions League. Now the focus of their frustration has switched to the man who is next in the hot-seat.
Rafael Benitez, identified almost entirely with his time at Liverpool, has been confirmed as the man to replace Di Matteo. He is the antithesis of what Chelsea fans want from a manager.
A man without the charisma of Mourinho, the credibility of Ancelotti, or the homeliness of Di Matteo - there is already talk of a harsh fan reaction to his appointment.
The belief among those I have spoken to is that Benitez has always benefited from the squads built by others: Hector Cuper at Valencia, Gerard Houllier at Liverpool.
His transfer record at Anfield includes a litany of £8m-£10m footballers, who ended up playing like £1m-£2m cloggers. They say his football is turgid, his identity forever Scouse. He simply is not who the Chelsea supporters want to lead the club.
If the club did not already know that, then they are even more out of touch with Chelsea fans than had previously been thought. Even more out of touch than a club that has just sacked one of the greatest heroes its fans have ever worshipped.
Chelsea knew when they appointed Di Matteo as assistant manager to Andre Villas-Boas back in summer 2011 that they were getting two things: a coach, and a legend.
The latter was the reason he was able to stabilise the club in the aftermath of Villas-Boas' sacking in March: fans, people around the club, players all trusted his knowledge, experience and passion in a time of trouble.
Now, as he is sacked for being apparently lacking in the coaching department, the club has difficulty in ridding itself of a legendary status that has only grown in his second period at Stamford Bridge.
In the hours since news broke, Chelsea supporters have clamoured to social media to reveal the scale of their discontent.
People have talked of their shame at the club's actions, and their sense of loss arising from the dismissal of someone they coinsidered one of their own. A common theme is that Chelsea's hierarchy have reduced the club to the status of a laughing stock.
Di Matteo 'got' Chelsea. He understood the fans. He knew that there was no greater victory than one over Tottenham (he managed two: 5-1 at Wembley, and 4-2 at White Hart Lane).
He knew that this is a club for whom hard-times meant something other than the potential failure to qualify from a Champions League group.
But he also knew that times and expectations had moved on: and that he was partly responsible for that.
No true match-going Chelsea fan I know likes managers being sacked. We cherish loyalty, and to abandon or abuse one of our own is most definitely not 'proper Chels'.
This sacking hurts. The sackings of Jose Mourinho and Carlo Ancelotti hurt too, but this seems to have hurt more. Because he was a link with the old Chelsea; because of what we went through together.
And ultimately because of success: Di Matteo is the only manager in Chelsea history to have out-specialed The Special One. The fact he has now been replaced by Benitez will be a bitter pill for the fans to swallow.
Di Matteo 'honoured' to manage Chelsea after sacking
The Italian has issued a statement through the League Managers' Association and lists last season's Champions League win with the club as the finest achievement of his career
Nov 21, 2012 11:50:00 PM
By Jordan Halford
Roberto Di Matteo has insisted it was "an honour" to have managed Chelsea, following his sacking on Wednesday morning.
The Italian was shown the door by Roman Abramovich just hours after the Blues were beaten 3-0 by Juventus to leave their Champions League hopes hanging by a thread.
Rafael Benitez has been hired as the 42-year-old's replacement, while the former midfielder has hailed last season's European triumph with the Blues as the greatest achievement of his entire career.
In a statement released via the League Managers Association, Di Matteo said: "It was an honour for me to be appointed manager of a club that I loved playing for and one that is so close to my heart.
"I am extremely proud of the successes and trophies that we were able to bring to the club in recent months.
"Lifting Chelsea's first Champions League trophy, in Munich, was the best achievement in club history and without doubt the highlight of my career to date, both as a player and manager.
"It is a memory I will treasure for the rest of my life.
"I have a deep and unreserved passion for Chelsea Football Club and I would like to sincerely thank all of the staff, my players and of course the Chelsea fans, for their tremendous and unconditioned support in the intense time I have been the manager at the Bridge.
"I wish all of them every success for the rest of the season and beyond."
I'd never take the Chelsea job: the words from 2007 that have come back to haunt Benitez (and don't get him started on the blue flags)
By CHRIS WHEELER PUBLISHED: 11:57 GMT, 22 November 2012 | UPDATED: 13:52 GMT, 22 November 2012
Wherever they go we’ll follow our team, For we are the Chelsea and we are supreme,
We'll never be mastered by no northern b******s, And we'll keep the blue flag flying high,
Flying high, up in the sky, We'll keep the blue flag flying high,
From Stamford Bridge to Wemb(er)ley, We'll keep the blue flag flying high.
Rafael Benitez may not be too familiar with the song but he certainly knows all about the pride Chelsea place in their flags on those Champions League nights.So when the club’s new interim boss arrives at the Bridge today desperately needing to build a few of his own, Benitez might struggle to explain comments he made in the past about Chelsea.
Flag wavers: Chelsea fans wave their flags prior to a game at Stamford Bridge
I'll never take that job: Rafael Benitez said he would never manage Chelsea out of respect for Liverpool
For instance, how’s he going to explain this one from five years ago? ‘Chelsea is a big club with fantastic players, every manager wants to coach a such a big team,’ said the Spaniard. ‘But I would never take that job, in respect for my former team at Liverpool, no matter what. For me there is only club in England, and that’s Liverpool.’ They loved him at Anfield and Benitez loves them too (he still lives on Merseyside more than two years after leaving Liverpool) which makes it all the more difficult to picture him in charge at Stamford Bridge.
And in 2007 before one of many epic European clashes between Liverpool and Chelsea, Benitez made a comment that was so popular at Anfield that they stuck the words on a plaque and put it on the training ground wall.‘We don’t need to give away flags for our fans to wave – our supporters are always there with their hearts, and that is all we need. It’s the passion of the fans that helps to win matches – not flags.’
Other versions of this quote refer to ‘stupid plastic flags’ and end with the words ‘Chelsea fans lack passion’, but that will be largely academic when Benitez walks out at Stamford Bridge on Sunday.‘I will never forgive him for the statement,’ posted one Chelsea supporter this week. ‘Don’t forget your plastic flag at the weekend!’ wrote another.
Hitting out: Benitez made a comment about Chelsea fans and their support that was made into a plaque and hung at Liverpool's Mellwood training ground
Not a fan: Benitez hit out at Chelsea fans and their flags
No-one has got under Chelsea’s skin quite like Benitez, which makes his appointment all the more baffling in the wake of the decision to axe Roberto Di Matteo.EXPLAIN THIS THEN, RAFA
'If Chelsea are naive and pure then I'm Little Red Riding Hood.' (2007)
'I'm sure Chelsea do not like playing Liverpool. When they are talking and talking and talking before the game it means they are worried. Maybe they're afraid?'
'We were good friends until Liverpool started winning, then he started changing his mind.' (on rival Jose Mourinho)
'To me, Arsenal played much better football two or three years ago. They won matches and were exciting to watch. They create excitement so how can you say Chelsea are the best in the world?' (after Chelsea's first Premier League title win)
'After the game, Sheila, who was sitting right in line, said to me that the ball had crossed the line. She is a very honest person and that was good enough for me. It was a goal.' (on taking his secretary's word that Luis Garcia's 'ghost goal' had crossed the line in the 2005 semi-final)
His six years at Anfield saw Liverpool face Chelsea in the Champions League five years in a row – including three semi-finals – as well as a League Cup Final and an FA Cup semi-final.They produced enough controversy, bad blood and, yes, barbed comments to make Benitez’s mission an almost impossible one even before he has walked through the door.
There was that ‘fact’ rant at Sir Alex Ferguson and the time he upset Everton by referring to them as ‘a small club’, but Chelsea and Jose Mourinho became a particular hobby horse.When asked about his relationship with the Special One, who twice refused to shake his hand after games between the two clubs, Benitez said: ‘We were good friends until Liverpool started winning, then he started changing his mind.’
Nothing got to Mourinho more than what he has always called the ‘ghost goal’ from Luis Garcia that saw Liverpool knock Chelsea out of the Champions League semi-final in 2005 en route to glory in Istanbul.Benitez risked further infuriating Chelsea and their manager by insisting the ball had crossed the line – on the say-so of his secretary Sheila.
Head to head: When in charge of Liverpool, Benitez and Chelsea's Jose Mourinho had plenty of battles
‘After the game Sheila, who was sitting right in line in the main stand, said to me that the ball had crossed the line,’ said Benitez. ‘She is a very honest person and that was good enough for me. It was a goal.’
The former Valencia boss has always been reluctant to credit Chelsea and Mourinho for their successes, instead making pointed references to the financial might behind them.‘We know Chelsea are a very good team,’ Benitez once said. ‘In the last five years they have spent big money on players.’
It crossed the line: Benitez angered Chelsea fans when he said that Luis Garcia 'ghost goal' in the Champions League semi final crossed the line - say-so of his secretary Sheila
After Mourinho helped Chelsea to their first Premier League title in 2004-05, Benitez merely criticised their lack of flair, saying: ‘To me, Arsenal played much better football two or three years ago. They won matches and were exciting to watch.‘Barcelona and Milan too. They create excitement so how can you say Chelsea are the best in the world?’
No thanks: Chelsea fan protested when Rafa Benitez was linked in March
Another barb followed before Liverpool knocked Chelsea out of the 2007 Champions League semi-final.‘I’m sure Chelsea do not like playing Liverpool,’ goaded Benitez. ‘When they are talking and talking and talking before the game it means they are worried. Maybe they’re afraid?’ And as they prepared to meet in the final four once again a year later, Benitez upset his opponents and striker Didier Drogba by revealing that he had put together a four-year dossier on the player’s diving antics.
Back to his best? Will Benitez be able to get the best from £50m striker Fernando Torres as he did at Liverpool?
Given Drogba’s cult status at Stamford Bridge and the fact that Chelsea are now weighing up the possibility of bringing him back on an emergency loan from his Chinese club Shanghai Shenhua, it’s one of several issues that threaten to make life rather uncomfortable for Benitez. It should be an interesting few months in west London.
OTHER MANAGERS WHO HAVE FACED MISSION IMPOSSIBLE
ALEX McLEISH (Aston Villa 2011-12)
Furious Villa fans staged protests when McLeish was appointed, not least because he had just been relegated with bitter rivals Birmingham playing a less-than-attractive style of football and then informed his club by email that he was quitting. Did Villa owner Randy Lerner know something we didn’t? No. Villa played a less-than-attractive style of football, McLeish became statistically their worst manager on record and was sacked as soon as the season ended.
GEORGE GRAHAM (Tottenham 1998-2001)
Like McLeish, Graham was hardly renowned for being an exponent of the beautiful game. He also had a very long association with Arsenal.
Graham led Spurs to their first trophy in eight seasons by winning the 1999 League Cup against Leicester, but they failed to finish higher than 10th in the table.
He was sacked in March 2001 for complaining about lack of transfer funds (not surprising given that he blew £11million on Sergey Rebrov) but claimed that new owners ENIC were merely looking for an excuse to get rid of him.
HARRY REDKNAPP (Southampton 2004-05)
Another manager who tried to cross the great divide and fell flat on his face.
Having quit his job at Portsmouth over the decision of Milan Mandaric to appoint Velimir Zajec as director of football, ‘Arry made the hugely controversial decision to take over at South Coast enemy Southampton in mid-season.
Redknapp was challenged with saving the Saints from relegation but failed and they went down for the first time in 27 years. Chairman Rupert Lowe must have known what was coming when he added England’s World Cup winning coach Sir Clive Woodward to his staff. Redknapp quit and went back to Pompey.
GARY MEGSON (Bolton 2007-09)
When Big Sam Allardyce left Bolton in 2007, they had some big shoes to fill and Megson never felt like the man to do it. He kept Wanderers in the Premier League and for a while was lauded as their ‘Ginger Mourinho’ but it was never going to last.
After he was put on gardening leave in December 2009, Megson admitted that he was fighting a losing battle to win the fans over. ‘I liked Bolton as a club, but the fans didn’t like me,’ he said recently. ‘I don’t particularly like them either!’
He won Abramovich the Champions League but was repeatedly told to play Torres: The real story behind Di Matteo's brutal sacking
Suffocated by Abramovich's diktat on always playing Torres
Wrestling to control a volatile and powerful dressing room
Constantly distracted by the racism dispute with Clattenburg
By NEIL ASHTON PUBLISHED: 23:41 GMT, 21 November 2012 | UPDATED: 07:24 GMT, 22 November 2012
When Roberto Di Matteo named his team at Turin’s luxurious Golden Palace Hotel on Tuesday lunchtime, it was a final act of defiance.Fernando Torres paid for his pitiful performance at West Bromwich on Saturday and Di Matteo knew the evening would end in yet another change in personnel. On this occasion, in the office of the Chelsea manager. But Di Matteo sensed the end was coming long before his 42nd and last game in charge. As early as last summer, when he dared question the strength of Torres’ ambition at Chelsea, the European Cup-winning coach was left in no doubt about who is actually in charge at Stamford Bridge.
The beginning of a remarkable journey: Roberto Di Matteo clutches Branislav Ivanovic and Fernando Torres after seeing off the challenge of Napoli in last year's Champions League
He told you so: How Neil Ashton broke the story in Wednesday's Sportsmail
When he was finally appointed ‘manager and first-team coach’, 25 days after landing club football’s greatest prize in Munich’s Allianz Arena, Di Matteo presented Roman Abramovich with a list of summer transfer targets. Radamel Falcao, the free-scoring striker with 36 goals in 50 appearances for Atletico Madrid in his first season in Spain, was at the top of it.
But before Chelsea’s manager could even make a case for the Colombian striker he was cut short. Abramovich told him he already had a world-class finisher and the message was clear: Torres was to play. It was a message that was repeated on an almost daily basis.
That was life at Chelsea for Di Matteo, operating under almost intolerable conditions long before he axed Torres ahead of the shocking 3-0 defeat against Juventus. He knew he had to select Torres. It was the owner’s wish. But he also knew there were problems using Torres when the players Abramovich had brought in did not suit the Spaniard’s style of play.
A round peg in a square hole: Torres is said to be unhappy and Chelsea and his attributes do not suit the club's style of play
Di Matteo had run the analysis on Torres, asking the club’s technical team for a breakdown of the 81 goals he scored for Liverpool before his move south to London. When Di Matteo went through the detail, a worrying pattern emerged that convinced him Chelsea did not have the personnel to accommodate his game.At Anfield, 56 of his goals (69 per cent) were engineered by defence-splitting passes, usually from Steven Gerrard or Xabi Alonso. At Chelsea, players like Juan Mata, Frank Lampard, Ramires and John Mikel Obi — together with new arrivals Oscar and Eden Hazard – preferred to pass their way through the opposition. They did not spring opposition defences and Di Matteo was already beginning to doubt whether Torres was committed to the Chelsea project.
Di Matteo’s relationship with technical director Michael Emenalo was already strained, but it was stretched to the limit by the pressure to get Torres among the goalscorers. Some sympathised, but others were openly questioning the motivation of a striker who was once regarded as the best finisher in world football.
Over bar the shouting: Di Matteo patrols the touchline at the Juventus Stadium, aware that his time at Chelsea is up
Upstairs in his office at the club’s Cobham training centre and puffing on cigarettes out on the balcony, Di Matteo frequently discussed Torres’ form with assistants Eddie Newton and Steve Holland.
It hardly helped that the £50million striker had confided in team-mates that he was unhappy at the club, even saying as much to a Spanish journalist on the night Chelsea lifted the European Cup. But a new season amounted to a new start for Di Matteo and Abramovich was quick to apply the same approval index rating he uses to judge every manager — Champions League progress. The day after Chelsea drew 2-2 with Juventus in the opening fixture in Group E, when goals from Arturo Vidal and Fabio Quagliarella secured a point for the Italians, Abramovich arrived unannounced at the training ground. He asked Di Matteo, his coaching staff and some of the players if they still had the desire for another crack at the competition after last season’s incredible triumph. By 3am on Wednesday, Di Matteo was clearing the decks of his spacious office after being sacked at the training ground by chairman Bruce Buck and chief executive Ron Gourlay, just over an hour after they arrived back from defeat in Turin.
The man of the moment: Six months ago, Di Matteo steered Chelsea to their first European Cup
He knew it was coming, saying farewell and shaking hands with the players in the dressing room at the Juventus Stadium.
The incredible stats
£86m: Chelsea have spent approximately £86million since 2004 in compensation for managers — more than Everton’s entire net spend since the Premier League began.
8 months: The average life span for a manager under Abramovich. Only Mourinho and Ancelotti lasted more than a year.
9: Abramovich has now had as many managers in his nine-year reign as United have had since 1937.
7: Chelsea have sacked seven managers since 2005 and won seven trophies.
These were private moments and a significant number of the team apologised to Di Matteo for failing to recreate the spirit that led to FA Cup and European glory last season. Three days earlier, in the dressing room at The Hawthorns, the fingers had been pointed by the players in a post-match inquest following the 2-1 defeat. It sounded explosive. Holland, the assistant manager, had arrived at the ground with a black eye and a cut underneath his left cheek. After the fireworks that followed the final whistle, it is a wonder there were no further casualties.
Chelsea’s season was beginning to fall apart and the situation was irretrievable even then. Abramovich had to be talked out of firing Di Matteo on Saturday by his close circle of advisors, but the Champions League clash with Juve was the tipping point. On Sunday the players came in for a warm-down at Cobham and flew on a delayed flight to Turin on Monday after Di Matteo held a short meeting with coaching staff.
The impossible job: Di Matteo takes charge of his final Chelsea training session in Turin
In Turin, Chelsea’s players picked up on Di Matteo’s distress and it transmitted to the squad in a subdued and sometimes directionless training session at Juve’s stadium on Monday evening. They knew he was about to make a tactical switch, but the message was muddled and there was uncertainty among the players as they chatted in hushed tones over dinner in the team hotel. In the team meeting at lunchtime on Tuesday, when Di Matteo announced that Hazard would play up front instead of Torres, this was met with the tacit approval of many of the players.
On the field they failed spectacularly, however, and Di Matteo, who spent 45 minutes talking to his Italian advisor in the tunnel after the defeat, knew the game was up. As they all got on the airport bus which delivered them to their Titan Airways flight — which finally took off at 1.45am from northern Italy — the atmosphere was tense. By that point Di Matteo and Newton, both in sharp, grey suits, were hanging on for grim life as the bus, with Buck and Gourlay in attendance, made the short trip to the aircraft steps.
Ruthless: Roman Abramovich wielded the axe for the seventh time since 2005
Ashley Cole giggled a couple of times. Petr Cech, a decent guy, made small talk with the kit men. Torres, who was reading a book entitled Leyenda (Legend) on the trip out to Turin, fiddled with his phone. Di Matteo knew that his number was up, unable to motivate a striker who has scored just four goals in the Barclays Premier League this season. Even Torres’ solitary Champions League strike was a fluke, a ricochet that somehow rebounded into the net of Andriy Pyatov in the 3-2 victory over Shakhtar Donetsk on November 7.
Undoubtedly Di Matteo under-estimated the owner’s obsession with winning silverware. Abramovich has not forgotten Jose Mourinho gesturing to him at Wembley, counting the trophies with his fingers when Chelsea won the FA Cup in 2007.
Chelsea started this season with a chance to win seven trophies, but the champions of Europe had already surrendered the Community Shield against Manchester City and were soundly beaten by Atletico Madrid in the Super Cup in Monaco. Abramovich, who rarely travels to away games because he does not like to conform to stuffy boardroom etiquette by wearing a suit, became increasingly agitated as Di Matteo’s summer target finished them off with a hat-trick.
Di Matteo’s team were also adjusting to a refined playing system as they encouraged Cech to throw the ball out to his back four instead of launching it forward from his penalty area. Off the field Di Matteo skilfully and diplomatically handled delicate situations, especially after John Terry was banned by the FA for four games and fined £220,000 for racially insulting Anton Ferdinand.
The incident did not even happen on Di Matteo’s watch — Andre Villas-Boas was manager at the time — but the Italian attempted to protect the reputation of the club. Even last Sunday, his preparations for the trip to Turin were disrupted when Ashley Cole was unexpectedly called to an interview with the FA over the allegations against referee Mark Clattenburg. Suddenly the FA’s compliance team were swarming all over the training ground again, taking Mikel, Ramires and Juan Mata into neutralised zones for hours of taped interviews.
Casting a shadow: Di Matteo felt the race row, involving referee Mark Clattenburg (centre) and John Mikel Obi (right) had an impact on recent results
Di Matteo has deep reservations about Chelsea’s complaint, and, naturally, believes that it has affected their recent results. They made the allegation two hours after they were beaten 3-2 at Stamford Bridge by Manchester United, finishing the game with nine men after the dismissals of Torres and Branislav Ivanovic. Since then they have picked up two points from the last 12 in the Premier League and require something of a miracle to avoid the humiliation of exiting the group stage of the Champions League.
That brutal reality dawned on Di Matteo when Chelsea arrived back at the training ground in the dead of night after the Turin trip. Torres was one of the first off the bus, jumping straight into his car and slipping on his tracksuit top to beat the near-freezing temperatures. By then, Di Matteo knew it was time to get his coat.
