Smashing idea: Chelsea's John Terry 'must accept squad rotation or play tennis instead'

6 Mar 2013 22:31

Blues skipper to return in Euro trip to Bucharest after three league games on the bench - as team-mate David Luiz warns NOBODY gets to play every match

Game on: Terry's set to start in Thursday's Europa League first-leg

Julian Finney

From Neil McLeman in Bucharest
David Luiz has told his Chelsea team-mates to quit football for TENNIS if they want to play every match.
The Blues play their 50th game of an eventful and far-flung season here in Romania on Thursday, against Steaua Bucharest in the first leg of a Europa League last-16 tie, before visiting Manchester United on Sunday in the pick of the FA Cup's quarter-finals.
Outgoing interim coach Rafa Benitez will rotate his side against the Romanian league leaders, despite the unhappiness of his English old guard.
John Terry is set to return to the cup side here after being an unhappy spectator for the last three Premier League matches.
But fellow centre-back Luiz, who has also been deployed in midfield, insisted sitting out matches is part of team sport.
“I don’t want to be on the bench or out of the squad - I want to be in the 11,” said the £21million star.
“I love to play. I don’t feel really good when I don’t play. Sometimes when you stay on the bench and you are fit, it is a bad feeling.
“But I understand sometimes you need to play other players. And to plan the game it is better to play other players than me. You need to understand this is one team, this is the quality of sport.
“If you want the team to do just my thing and play always, play tennis or an individual sport. All the players in the world want to play and don’t want to stay on the bench.
“The feeling is just for a couple of minutes and then after that, inside your head, you think, ‘This is normal.’”
Benitez, who will take charge of his first away match since his Middlesbrough rant last week, said: “The point is to convince the players that they cannot play every single game. The main thing is to manage the squad.
“Some players want to play every single game so I have to say, ‘Listen, I know that you can do well, but just in case you will be tired, we need fresh legs and we have to use the squad’. So that is my job, to manage the squad.
"If we do it properly, I don’t think fatigue will be a problem.”
Chelsea's fight to finish in the top four and qualify for next season's Champions League is being put on hold for three cup games in the next week - starting against Steaua, the 1986 champions of Europe, in the impressive 55,600-capacity National Arena.
“It’s a massive week and Chelsea need to win,” Luiz continued. “It’ll be difficult - when you play as the champions of Europe, Bucharest will come at us with massive power until the end.
"This is a chance to win another title. It’s a European title.

Real opportunity: Luiz hopes Chelsea can deepen Man United's misery

PA

 
“Sunday is also a massive game, a game everyone in the world will love to watch. This season, it’s not gone as well for Chelsea as last season [did], so we need to win the titles we’re still in.”
Chelsea failed to win in three matches under new coach Benitez after getting knocked out of Europe’s premier competition in January.
And Luiz reckons Manchester United could still be suffering a hangover on Sunday following their Euro exit on Tuesday at the hands of Real Madrid.
“I think it’s difficult when you’ve been knocked out of an amazing competition like the Champions League,” he said.
“Your confidence is not the same. The happiness inside your heart is not the same. Chelsea can take this for our side as a bonus to win this game. Maybe it gives us an advantage.”
Luiz also said he was helping his fellow Brazilian Oscar, who has scored six of his nine goals in Europe this season, to realise his prodigious talent.
“My job, like other players in the team, is to give confidence to the young guys like Oscar,” he added.
“Some players need this. He is so shy but I say: ‘Come on, you have the quality to be in a side with the best players in the world and you have the opportunity to show that’.” ----Mirror Football

Pls tell me, Do u think the Terry Era is Over?