Didier Drogba criticises Todd Boehly at Chelsea after Real Madrid defeat - 'I knew this club with a certain class'
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ByEurosport
Updated 19/04/2023 at 13:50 GMT
Didier Drogba, who is Chelsea's fourth highest goalscorer of all time, has criticised the club's current ownership group with the club in the bottom half of the Premier League table and without a win in their last seven matches. Drogba says that Chelsea lack class like the club had when it was owned by Roman Abramovich and thinks "they go back to the principles and values they had".
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Didier Drogba says he "no longer recognises" Chelsea and accuses the club's owners of "lacking class" since the club was sold last year by Roman Abramovich to Todd Boehly and Clearlake Capital.
Chelsea were knocked out of the Champions League after a 2-0 defeat to Real Madrid at Stamford Bridge on Tuesday night.
Two goals from Rodrygo ensured a 4-0 aggregate win for the La Liga champions and extended Chelsea's winless run in all competitions to seven matches with interim boss Frank Lampard overseeing their fourth loss in a row.
Influential personnel at Chelsea such as Bruce Buck, Marina Granovskaia and Petr Cech left the club soon after Boehly's consortium completed a full takeover of the London club in May 2022.
Drogba, a club legend who scored the Blues' winning penalty in the Champions League final against Bayern Munich in 2012, has criticised the club's current regime.
"I knew this club with a certain class during the Abramovich era, but today I find it lacking," he told Canal+.
"It’s very hard for me to see how they got rid of certain people. They should go back to the principles and values they had.
"I no longer recognise my club. There is a new owner and a new vision. Of course, we try to compare it with what happened during the [Roman] Abramovich era where a lot of players were brought in, but the decisions were very intelligent.
"Bringing in players like Petr Cech, Andriy Shevchenko, Hernan Crespo, Michael Essien, Didier Drogba, Florent Malouda, and I go on. It was done to win titles.
"They are players with a certain experience. The strategy is now different; we bet on young players. But a dressing room of over 30 players is difficult [to manage] for a manager.
"They lack charismatic leaders. You need players that take on the game, that assume their responsibilities. You need a player that brings a bit of madness to the stadium."
Boehly reportedly labelled Chelsea's season as "embarrassing" in a dressing room speech following their 2-1 defeat to Brighton on Saturday. The American and co-owner Behdad Eghbali also entered the dressing room again after the 2-0 defeat on Tuesday.
Lampard refused to respond to Drogba's comments, but hopes Chelsea can finish the season on a positive note despite there being little chance of qualifying for Europe next season.
"We can set the building blocks now of where we want to get to," he said.
"I’ve come into that. Can I affect it in that period? Hopefully. We want to get back to where we were. But everyone’s doing the same, everyone’s invested, everyone’s getting better.
"Maybe some clubs are more stable than we are in terms of the squad. I don’t think we can get ahead of ourselves."
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