ANCELOTTI SPEAKS!!!!

Very rarely do I ever cover a complete interview written in the press or featured in a published interview. I'd rather take a snippet from it and discuss the key point I want to discuss and post a link to the rest of it.

However, Carlo Ancelotti is featured this morning in an interview with Matt Lawton in the Daily Mail and it's an intriguing and interesting interview. So much so, I am going to post all of it on here as I personally feel that it's the least the Italian deserved.

Hold your hand up, most of us expected Ancelotti to get the push after what happened in our second season and especially because of our performances under him in the Champions League. However, none of us thought it would be as ruthless as it turned out to be straight after the game at Everton.

So here in full is Carlo Ancelotti's interview in full:

"Football is the most important of the less important things in life. I love London. I love England. I love the football in England. The culture of the football. The atmosphere at the grounds. The competitive nature of the Premier League.

Right now England is the best country in the world for football. In Spain you have just two teams. There is not the same competition in their championship. Here it is different. There are lots of good teams and I have to thank Chelsea for giving me the opportunity to be here.

If I hadn’t come to Chelsea, if Chelsea hadn’t come for me, I would not have had that experience. I would not know what I know now.

I haven’t said I want to take a year out, I’ve said I’m not afraid to spend one year out, trying to find a solution that enables me to stay in English football. If I can find the right solution, the right team, I will be very happy.

I have been keeping myself busy, working for Italian TV when the Champions League has been on. And I will go to Manchester United and Real Madrid to watch training. I have been a manager for 15 years and this is a chance to go and learn something new.

But now I feel I want to be able to wake up every morning and go training. Until now it has not been so difficult. It was the summer, there were no games. I went on holiday. I went to Vancouver.

I was still on holiday when Chelsea played at Stoke, so I was not so upset. But now it is a little bit strange for me. I need to find a solution.

I thought I could stay longer at Chelsea, I hoped to, because I felt really good there. I was not happy to leave this club and to leave these people. I had a good relationship with the players. I felt we could go on to enjoy more success. But this is football and I knew this before I went there.

I want to say thank you, to Roman Abramovich, to the players, to all the people I worked with there. The first year was fantastic. The second year was not so good. I am not bitter or angry. Absolutely not. I consider Chelsea a really fantastic club.

Look, when I was in Milan everything was fantastic but I knew that one day it would come to an end. Even after being a player there. Even after the success I also enjoyed there as a manager. In the end you have to leave.

I also had other experiences like that in Italy. I had been sacked before. Sometimes it can happen that the owner is not happy and he wants to change things. All the great managers have been sacked. Managers before me at Chelsea were sacked. Fabio Capello was sacked by Madrid after winning the title. Amazing, I know, but this is football.

Never, however, on my c.v. have I been sacked during the season. That is different. I have only ever been sacked at the end of the season. I am proud of this!

If they have something to tell me I prefer to know immediately. Until the end, I felt my future depended on the results. I hoped I would stay. But when Ron came to me after the press conference at Everton and said he needed to speak to me, I knew what was coming.

Ron was very professional about it. The players were on the bus. We were in the dressing room alone. He told me and that was that. I then went to the bus. I did not give a speech. I spoke to my staff, to the players, individually. And then we got on the plane. It is not true that they wanted me to go home in a car. I flew with the team back to Gatwick, we then went on to Cobham and then some of us went into London for a party - my staff, some of the players.

The first season did go well, The team was good, the players were very professional. They helped me when my English was not so fluent and I thank them for that.

I tried to get Andrea Pirlo to join us when I arrived. I wanted to play him in central midfield. He’s 32 now but doing very well at Juventus. He would have been good for Chelsea.

But that season we built a good identity of play, which I think Roman was happy with, and while going out in the last 16 of the Champions League was a disappointment I think it was the catalyst for what we then achieved. There was a fresh determination that propelled us towards the Double.

Lampard, to Terry and to Essien. Drogba had malaria. It was a difficult period and when we started to lose some games we suffered a loss of confidence.

I don’t think that was the reason we started to struggle, Because we did recover, to the point where we still had a chance to win the championship when we went to Manchester United. We won eight games in nine.

Again, we were disappointed about losing in the Champions League. But right now, with Barcelona, that is a very difficult competition to win. I think Inter Milan were a little lucky to beat them.

I enjoyed a good relationship with Roman and I think he supported me as much as I tried to support his philosophy.

He backed me in the transfer market with players like Fernando Torres and David Luiz. I could not have asked for more and while Torres was not fully fit, he will be good again. His problem was a physical one - he is mentally strong - but I think we are starting to see now that the problem is behind him.

But, as I’ve said, if you don’t deliver success year after year there is always a danger he will make a change. I knew that when I went there.’
Ancelotti was dumped for a younger man.

Villas-Boas has good knowledge and that is what you need. Good knowledge and an ability to build a relationship with the players. And an ability to make them feel a sense of pride in the shirt they are wearing. You see that at Manchester United and at Barcelona. You see the Manchester United shirt gives players more power.

That is the way I like to manage. I do not use a whip. I never have. I treat players like adults.

(Source)

So what are your thoughts on Carlo and this interview? One thing is for sure. He will go down in our history as the manager that brought the double to Stamford Bridge and no one can take that away from him.

KTBFFH

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