POCH’S RUUD AWAKENING
Spineless, bloated squad and players don’t know what they’re doing... Mauricio must get hold of dressing room
RUUD GULLIT has a simple message for new Chelsea chief Mauricio Pochettino: Sort out your dressing room.
The Dutch great and former Blues boss welcomed the Argentine’s arrival at Stamford Bridge, saying the club needed someone with “authority and a reputation.”
Pochettino ticks those two boxes, but Gullit believes his first job will be to instil a spirit that has ebbed away after January’s trolley dash in the transfer market.
Gullit, 60, said: “The main problem isn’t just in the boardroom.
“I think there are issues in the dressing room – there must be.
“There’s something going on where these players don’t want to fight for each other. The environment doesn’t encourage that.
Attitude
“The attitude seems to be: ‘So, I’m not playing. Why? I don’t care. I earn enough money. So, shall I go to another club? Do they pay me the same money? If not, who cares, I’ll stay here’.
“They don’t look like they want to do everything for the club.
“And it’s going to take a manager with a reputation and authority to sort it out.
“Because look what happened under Graham Potter. The lineups changed all the time.
“Frank Lampard comes in and what happens? Every week, there’s another line-up.
“They change the team all the time. The players need to know
the spine of the team. Chelsea don’t have a clue what that is.
“If you’re changing it all the time, players don’t know if they’re going to play from one week to the next – and that’s not good.
“Why does it change so much?
“All of them are good players. There aren’t any bad players there. But there’s no urgency. There’s something that doesn’t add up. It’s
not right.” Gullit believes the new year transfer splurge has diluted any spirit and says that there are too many senior professionals.
And that the squad size needs to be trimmed – although he believes the club will have to take a financial hit. He said: “There are too many players. Too many good players. How many are there? Thirty?
Complain
“If you’ve been bought by Chelsea, then you are at a level and you want to play. But they will complain if they are not in the team.
“The players who aren’t playing are going to talk bad. That’s normal. But if Chelsea win, they have nothing to say. They shut up.
“And now you have players who are in the team on Sunday and out of it on Wednesday.
They are moaning, too. Chelsea aren’t winning. So they all moan. There are uncertainties everywhere.
“And it’s the ones who don’t play who are the ones you have to be careful of. So, the group is too big. It’s creating a horrible atmosphere.
“And they took a gamble, buying all these players and putting them on long contracts.
“Did they ever stop to think how they were going to sell them if it didn’t click? It doesn’t look like it.”
Ruud Gullit was speaking at the Laureus World Sports awards. www.laureus.com
These players don’t want to fight for each other. The environment there doesn’t encourage that