Blues double stars salute Ancelotti
THE FA CUP FINAL 2010
FRANK LAMPARD and John Terry, two of the players closest to Jose Mourinho during his reign as Chelsea manager, have hailed double-winning boss Carlo Ancelotti as the equal of the self-styled Special One.
Ancelotti led his squad on an open-topped bus parade through west London yesterday as ecstatic Blues fans turned out in their thousands to celebrate adding the FA Cup to their Premier League triumph.
The Italian has attained hero status at Stamford Bridge after less than a year at the helm, having masterminded the first double in the club’s history. The task now will be to emulate Mourinho by winning back-to-back titles, or surpass him by delivering the holy grail of club football, the Champions League trophy.
But regardless of his future success, Lampard believes Ancelotti already ranks alongside the charismatic Portuguese as the two greatest coaches to have moulded a Chelsea team.
“Jose Mourinho and him are both great managers who will both go down in history, and rightly so,” he said. “People talk about this club and the Russian revolution and the Champions League, but you cannot take away winning the double. It is a huge achievement in English football history and Chelsea had never done it. So now we have become the most successful team we have ever had.
“Jose was fantastic and goes down in history as the man who brought us back the league title. He will be the best Chelsea manager along with Ancelotti now for what he has done, and they both deserve that title, simple as that.”
Terry, who with Lampard and Drogba formed the spine of a Mourinho side that won two league titles and an FA Cup, said: “Jose is always going to be a massive part of this football club but Carlo has come in and has gone down in history in his first season.
“No other manager or group of players has ever done that. Jose will never be forgotten at this football club, pretty similar to Carlo and this group of players.”
Mourinho’s Inter secure Serie A crown
WHILE his former charges enjoyed their double parade, Jose Mourinho clinched his own as Inter Milan sealed the Serie A title.
A 1-0 win over Siena was enough to earn Inter a fifth successive league title and, following their success in the Coppa Italia, the double.
Mourinho could yet trump Carlo Ancelotti by scooping the treble against Bayern Munich in Saturday’s Champions League final.
Elsewhere in Europe, Barcelona yesterday won the Spanish league title.