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MANCINI WARY OF CHELSEA

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The Manchester City manager Roberto Mancini has said that he is extremely wary of a threat posed by Chelsea in the title race, despite the team struggling with a number of bad results in recent weeks. This has prompted to change the manager Roberto di Matteo, who has been replaced by Rafael Benitez. Despite the arrival of the former Liverpool man, the club has been unable to get back to winning ways after they have suffered draws against Manchester City and Fulham in the last two matches. The Manchester United manager Sir Alex Ferguson recently suggested that it was a two horse title race between the two Manchester clubs.

However, Mancini believes that Chelsea should not be discounted from this title race because they have players who can make the difference. It has been six matches without a win in the league for Chelsea. They will be facing yet another London derby in the weekend against West Ham. Due to the fact that there are still 24 matches remaining in the league, it is very wrong to discount Chelsea as not a proposition in the title race. Mancini has pointed out to the number of points City made up for United in the last six matches of the season.

“I think Chelsea could be in it. We have another 24 games. It is too long to say. Last year in [the last] six games we recovered eight points. Teams like Tottenham and Arsenal can recover these points in the next 24 games but it is difficult to say this now. Everton started the season very well. They can finish in the Europa League but also they have the quality to finish fourth,” said Mancini ahead of the match with Everton, who were the last team to win at the Etihad stadium.

Cech: Di Matteo was right to rest Mata

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It would be fair to say that Juan Mata was the best player on the park during Chelsea’s 4-2 win over Tottenham, with the Spaniard well and truly pulling the strings during the victory. Following his highly impressive performance, Petr Cech has lauded praise on the player and insisted that Roberto Di Matteo’s decision to rest him for two weeks has paid dividends.

Mata was the star of the show on Saturday, with the Blues coming back from being 2-1 down to completely outclass Spurs and strengthen their hold at the top of the Premier League. As well as scoring twice, the former Valencia midfielder was a constant thorn in the side of Andre Villas-Boas’ side, with the club’s former manager even lavishing praise on the player he brought to Stamford Bridge just over twelve months ago.

Following on from the classy performance, goalkeeper Cech has praised all his teammates. He told talkSPORT that the team did fantastically well to win their first game at White Hart Lane in years, while also complimented Di Matteo’s approach in relation to Mata, “It was a great reaction from 2-1 down. We haven’t won here for a long time and then you think here we go again but it was not the case, we knew how to get back into the game and in the end we scored some great goals. It was important to give him [Mata] a break. You can’t play two seasons in a row and the Euros. You can see he benefited from that, he’s still got the hunger to play. It’s great to see him playing like that.”

The win over Spurs means that the Blues retain their place at the top of the division, with 2nd place Manchester United still four points behind following the opening eight games.

MOSES IS A GREAT FIT

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The Chelsea manager Roberto di Matteo has told Chelsea FC News that he believes that the Wigan athletic winger Victor Moses is exactly the type of player Chelsea need at the moment. After many weeks of discussion with the Premier league club, Chelsea finally managed to secure his signature for around £ 9 million. Victor Moses came to prominence with Crystal Palace before moving to Wigan athletic for around £ 2.5 million. Chelsea initially came with a bid of around £ 3.5 million, which was rejected initially by Wigan. However, after making many increased over the past couple of weeks, Chelsea have finally decided to offer the asking price of £ 9 million for the player.

The Chelsea manager Roberto di Matteo reckons that it is money well spent because Victor Moses is a player who will definitely suit Chelsea because of the new dimension that they will adopt this season. It is expected that the club will be adopting a pass style of football similar to Barcelona following the additions of players like Eden Hazard and Oscar. As a result of these additions, the midfield of the club has become extremely strong according to the manager Roberto di Matteo, who has said that Victor Moses will be capable of playing on the wings for Chelsea.

“Roberto Martinez has done a wonderful job with this player since signing him. He’s really developed him. He had a very good season last year and hopefully we can progress his development He can play on either wing and wing and will give the team width. He has good dribbling ability, has pace and is powerful. We’ve tried very hard to get this player. We like him very much. He’s young and hopefully he’ll be the future of the club,” said Roberto di Matteo after securing the signature of the Nigerian international.