Connect with us

Ex Players

Roberto Di Matteo Takes On Dons Role

\Former Chelsea midfielder Roberto Di Matteo has been confirmed as MK Dons new manager and is set to be unveiled at a press conference today.  A statement on the club’s official website read “Like the club itself, Roberto is young, ambitious and hungry to succeed. We are enormously excited about the team moving forward under his leadership.” Although not that excited that they’d give him a deal beyond a year just yet apparently.

38 year old Di Matteo, spent the best part of his playing career at Chelsea and will always remain a firm favourite with supporters. His dynamic midfield displays saw him become one of the driving forces behind our resurgence and brought us some great moments, not least of all, his FA Cup winning goals against Middlesbrough and Aston Villa.

But whilst his FA Cup goal within 43 seconds against Boro left us open-mouthed in awe, the triple leg fracture he sustained against St. Gallen in the Uefa Cup had our jaws dropping for a very different reason. And the sadness I felt on that night was only matched when some 18 months later he was forced to give up his fight to return to football and announce his retirement after six years with the club.

During his playing days, Di Matteo won 34 caps for his country and was named in Chelsea’s greatest ever XI. However, as he steps up for what is his first managerial position it would be prudent to remember that some of the best players have failed when it comes to transferring what they’ve learnt on the pitch into the coaching arena. I’ve no doubt he’ll want to impress his style on the players although whether he’ll have the sort of players to absorb that remains to be seen. He’s certainly a very likeable bloke but he might well have to toughen up a bit in order to command the respect he needs in management. Having played at all levels of the game himself, this knowledge should stand him in good stead and if he appoints a decent number two as well, he might just do ok. The likelihood is he’ll bring Eddie Newton on board and with the work he’s done at Chelsea with the youngsters, bringing in someone with this sort of experience could be a very shrewd move.

Stepping into Ince’s shoes won’t be easy though. The former United and Liverpool player, who, like the rest of the ex-United stars invading the world of Premier League management these days had the benefit of learning from the Premier League’s most successful manager, did a sterling job with MK Dons’ and, having moved on to Blackburn, he’ll be a tough act to follow.

I’ll no doubt be keeping half an eye on their results next season and I wish him every success.

Categories

Archives

Blue is the colour

TheChelseaBlog.org is an honest insight to the World of Chelsea FC. Not always pretty, sometimes rather cynical, but always realistic.









Calendar

July 2008
M T W T F S S
« Jun   Aug »
 123456
78910111213
14151617181920
21222324252627
28293031  
Chelsea News



Chelsea Blog FaceBook Icon Chelsea Blog Twitter
Chelsea News

More in Ex Players