CONTE NEW £40m DEAL
ARSENAL v CHELSEA
ANTONIO CONTE is set to sign a staggering new £40million contract at Chelsea.
The title-winning Italian – who will step up his English lessons this summer – is planning a short break after today’s FA Cup Final.
He will return for talks which the club hope will end with him signing a £9.6m-a-year contract, taking him to 2021. The new terms will make Conte, who has two years left on his current deal, the highest-paid manager in Chelsea’s history.
Inter Milan’s Chinese investors had made a string of massive offers to tempt the former Juventus boss back to Serie A.
But the Premier League champions are set to back Conte in this transfer market this summer with a massive transfer kitty.
He is also looking for a property so that his wife Elisabetta and daughter Vittoria are able to join him in London.
Conte said: “We have to finish this season but we’ve started to work for next season.
“For sure, we’ll try to improve our squad because we have to face an important competition in the Champions League.
“But I think the club and me have the same point of view on this.
“I know very well that in modern football it is very difficult to stay a long time at the same club.
“But if you have the opportunity to work for many years, you can improve your work. For a coach, that’s the best solution – to stay for a long time in the same club and build something important.”
Chelsea have lost only one of their last 12 competitive games against Arsenal. But Conte said: “I know very well the history of Arsenal in the FA Cup, also with Arsene Wenger. They won a lot of trophies in this tournament.
“I’ve never won this trophy. For this reason it could be a good possibility for me, for my team, to try and lift the trophy.”
Conte’s star man Eden Hazard has declared Chelsea’s newest generation of serial winners ready to rumble.
With John Terry set to join Didier Drogba, Frank Lampard and Ashley Cole in completing his tour of duty, Hazard is one of several key men determined to show there are still leaders able to step up at the Bridge.
He said: “The last 10 years at Chelsea has been great. They won a lot of trophies, now it’s like a new generation.
“Lampard is finished, Drogba is finished, Ashley Cole, John Terry now. So it’s a new generation and we want to prove that the club is one of the best in the world. We have to be ready for that.
“I am now playing my fifth year at Chelsea. We also have other guys who have a lot of experience, so we are ready. I try to be a leader on the pitch. We have a lot of guys who can do that.”