Frank Lampard fully expects Chelsea to be challenging for the Premier League title next season and claims finishing in the top-four this term would be an achievement for his former side.
The Blues were riding high at the start of the season following defeat to Manchester City in Maurizio Sarri’s first game in charge – a 2-0 loss in the Community Shield at Wembley.
After that the ex-Napoli tactician led the Blues on an 18-game unbeaten run in all competitions and there was even talk of a three-horse title race between them and champions City and Liverpool.
But Sarri’s side have since fallen away, suffering embarrassing defeats to City – a 6-0 hammering at Etihad Stadium earlier this month was their heaviest defeat in nearly 30 years – and a 4-0 thrashing at Bournemouth, while a 2-0 defeat on Monday night saw them dumped out of the FA Cup by Manchester United.
Asked what his former side have to do in order to close the gap to the top two – Chelsea are sixth in the Premier League, 15 points adrift of joint leaders City and Liverpool – Lampard told Sport360 in an exclusive interview: “They have to keep working. I think it comes down to good players and Chelsea certainly have good players.
Lampard’s Derby are on the cusp of the Championship play-offs, two points behind sixth-placed Bristol City.
“It comes down to constantly looking for progression and I know Chelsea do that as a club. You can’t stand still in any walk of life and that’s particularly true in football at the moment, people are always looking for improvement and it’s the same at Chelsea.
“It’s all there, the fundamentals, at Chelsea. They’re just searching for that consistency and excellence and I expect them to be in the hunt, in the conversation, with Man City and Liverpool and United.”
Lampard was speaking thanks to his partnership with nanoM – a state-of-the-art health assessment clinic located at the Golden Mile Galleria on Dubai’s Palm Jumeirah.
The former Chelsea midfielder, 40, had been identified earlier this week as a candidate to replace Sarri, alongside former Real Madrid coach Zinedine Zidane, but he admitted he is focused fully on the task at hand as Derby County boss.
Immediately on Chelsea’s agenda is Sunday’s Carabao Cup final at Wembley against City.
And Lampard feels that finishing in the top four, thus getting back into the Champions League, or winning a trophy, would constitute a successful season for Sarri’s side.
“Success for Chelsea now is always going to be judged on results,” added the 106-times capped England international.
“They come in that top bracket of teams where success demands results, where you end up or what cup competitions you can win.
United beat Chelsea 2-0 at Stamford Bridge on Monday.
“It’s been a bit of a difficult season for Chelsea in terms of they started well and since then they’ve had some difficulties in certain games, you can tell that from their league position. But I certainly don’t think they can be judged on their league position necessarily at this moment.
“The difficult thing is for all these top clubs now, there’s improvement all the time. It’s tough. Only a certain amount of teams can win leagues and cups every year and to try and aspire to it is one thing, but to actually do it is very difficult. That’s the hard bit for Chelsea.
“But one thing you do well at a big club, you’re resilient and you come back. So even though they’ve had a tough period I truly expect them to come back strong and I think success this season would be to be in the top four and try and win the cups they’re still in.”
