SOCCER:As he accepted the man of the match award for his two goals at Goodison Park yesterday, Frank Lampard responded to a question about his immediate future by saying that he hoped the new year would find him playing for a winning team. He did not specify Chelsea.
With his present deal due to expire next summer, tomorrow marks the day on which Lampard becomes free to sign a pre-contractual agreement with a club outside England. There will be no shortage of suitors, among them his former manager Carlo Ancelotti, now with vast funds available from the Qatari owners of Paris Saint-Germain.
Lampard captained the side in the absence of the injured John Terry, as he did in Munich last May when, with Terry suspended, Chelsea won the European Cup.
Transfer value
If it is hard to imagine the club parting with a player who has given them so much over 11 and a half seasons, it is also necessary to look at his transfer value, which might be considerable during the coming transfer window but will dwindle to zero when he becomes a free agent in six months’ time.
“Sign him up,” the travelling fans chanted after he had equalised three minutes before half-time and nudged Chelsea into the lead with just under half an hour to play.
But with Uefa’s financial fair play demands looming, Chelsea’s money men might see this as an opportunity to adjust the balance in their favour by putting a few million in the bank. Lampard’s commitment to the cause would be missed, as would the enormous experience and footballing wisdom of a man whose relevance on the pitch remains undiminished.
PSG will surely be competing in the Champions League again next year, whether or not Ancelotti is still in charge, and Paris might suit Lampard.
Another congenial location might be Los Angeles, where he would make a perfect replacement for David Beckham at the Home Depot Center, although after a display like yesterday’s he may feel there is no need to settle for a drop into a less competitive league just yet.
The goals against Everton – his 193rd and 194th for the club in all competitions since his arrival from West Ham in 2001 – offered a reminder of the years in which he was so remarkably prolific for Chelsea, a provider of 20-plus goals per season in five consecutive campaigns between 2005-06 and 2009-10.
League appearance
This was only Lampard’s sixth league start for Chelsea this season and his 11th league appearance in all. At times it has seemed that there would no longer be a place for him in a midfield populated by younger men such as Juan Mata, Eden Hazard, Oscar, Ramires and John Obi Mikel. Against Everton, with David Luiz against stepping out of the back four into a role at the base of the midfield, Lampard began the match in a semi-withdrawn position.
Lampard had not been much in evidence before he struck the first of his decisive blows. Hazard’s corner from the left led to Fernando Torres retrieving the ball on the right and feeding Ramires, whose improvised cross was met at the far post by Lampard’s firm header.
Half an hour later a neat passage of interplay between Torres and Mata set up a cross from Hazard and a shot from Mata that rebounded to Lampard, who nudged it home.
These opportunistic strikes showed a undiminished instinct for arriving in the right place at the right time.
Everton made a terrific contribution to an absorbing and entertaining game, particularly in the first half, when Leon Osman and Steven Pienaar looked like Goodison’s own Xavi and Iniesta. But overall David Moyes’s players could not quite match the individual quality in which Roman Abramovich has made such a huge investment, or the undimmed predatory instincts of a veteran who stole their thunder and sealed their fate.
Guardian Service
