Four Chelsea players and Frank Lampard answered some common questions fans have in an interactive, behind-the-scenes video series at Cobham and Stamford Bridge.
Early in the season, Chelsea had a slight incident against Valencia that blew up into the kind of negative narrative that only Chelsea fans (“only” meaning “along with every other specie of football fan”) could produce. Who was the rightful penalty kick-taker: Ross Barkley or Jorginho? Or was it Willian? If one player was on the pitch but another wasn’t, who was primary and who was backup? Did anyone – including the players – actually know any of this?
Many fans weren’t sure when Ross Barkley took the ball and held it tightly to take the spot kick against Valencia. In some ways, it was reminiscent of the Kepa Arrizabalaga – Maurizio Sarri incident. Conflict and confusion broke out, the resulting penalty kick (kicks, in Arrizabalaga’s case) went against the Blues, and the manager was left making a wan statement in response.
Now imagine how much more confusing it would have been had Frank Lampard been able to go onto the pitch and take the kick himself against Valencia.
Sure, that seems far-fetched, but so did everything in the 118′ of the Carabao Cup final.
In an interactive video produced by 90min, Frank Lampard was asked who would take penalties, him or Jorginho, if they were on the same team.
Lampard praised Jorginho’s penalty-taking ability (he’s now the undisputed penalty kick-taker if he’s on the pitch), and contrasted his own “strike through the ball” technique to Jorginho’s “unique” way of waiting for the goalkeeper to move before placing the ball.
But Lampard had no hesitation about saying that if he was playing, he’d be taking the penalties. He scored 60 and missed only 10 in his career. However, Jorginho has missed only one of his 21 attempts in open play, that caveat being quite relevant to the Carabao Cup incident.
Willian fielded a similar question: Who’s better at free kicks, him or his current manager?
Willian similarly mentioned how they use different techniques, but either out of humility, honesty or a desire for job security, the Brazilian said “For sure, I think he was better than me.”