One of Liam Rosenior’s former team-mates has labeled him “unrecognizable” from his playing days, as the Chelsea head coach’s woes continue. The Blues suffered a crushing defeat to Paris Saint-Germain 8-2 on aggregate on Tuesday, bringing their European tour to an end.
The reigning European champions defeated the Premier League outfit late in the first leg, leaving Chelsea with a mountain to climb after losing 5-2 in Paris. Hopes for an unlikely comeback were quickly dashed as the hosts found themselves down 2-0 after just 15 minutes of the night.
But former Hull City team-mate Kevin Kilbane believes Rosenior has acquired a new personality since stepping into the dugout. He said on Off the Ball: “I played with Liam at Hull and I was good friends with him, and he used to tell me great stories about Roy Keane when he was manager at Ipswich.
“And looking at him now, to me he is unrecognizable as a player and as someone I knew. He is like he swallowed a psychologist’s manual or a sports coach’s memoir. Everything he says to me is not waffle or drivel or anything.”
“He’s trying to write down as many quotes as he can and every time he’s dealing with the media he’s trying to pull me into pre-match and post-match talk. If I was a player being asked to do that huddle, if I was a Chelsea player, I wouldn’t be comfortable.”
Chelsea held a pre-match huddle in the center circle ahead of the second leg against PSG, but did not surround the ball to ‘protect’ it as they did against Newcastle at the weekend. The two-time European champions will return to action at the weekend when they take on Everton in the Premier League.
After losing to PSG, the FA Cup became even more of a priority for Chelsea, with their first international match now being a quarter-final match against Port Vale. But then their bid to return to the Champions League will resume with a home match against Manchester City.
