Chelsea’s only centurion: Olivier Giroud shows old fashioned experience

Olivier Giroud has reached 100 caps for his country. Chelsea needs experience like that as they move into their new era while drawing on the old.

There is just something special about 100 appearances. Antonio Conte famously believed it took youth about 100 professional matches before they would be ready for a team like Chelsea. It is not as rare as it used to be, but Chelsea still only has nine players with 100 plus appearances for the club. Narrow it down to just the Premier League and that number drops to just three (Cesar Azpilicueta, N’Golo Kante, and Marcos Alonso). Hitting the milestone in any which way implies a level of experience.

But 100 international caps? That’s the golden goose. That’s a true accomplishment. In fact, Chelsea’s only centurion just reached the land mark this break: Olivier Giroud. International football is, at its heart, pretty dumb but it can still be valuable for the experience of a player like Giroud.

In fact, only Thiago Silva is relatively close to 100 international caps at the moment and he might only just squeak that out before he retires or leaves Chelsea (whichever comes first). The younger players obviously have time on their side but it is so hard to tell which players will pull an Azpilicueta and stay for the long haul. Even the Spaniard himself, always on the periphery of Spain because of the Real Madrid and Barcelona duopoly, only has 25 national team appearances.

That should paint a picture of how impressive Giroud’s achievement is. But it gets even better in context. Giroud’s first cap came in 2011 when he was 25. That is relatively late for an international debut but then look around at the players he has had to compete with for minutes throughout his French career. Karim Benzema, Alexandre Lacazette, Antoine Griezmann, Anthony Martial, and Kylian Mbappe have either be kept out or forced out wide to make room for Giroud over his nearly 10 year international career. In fact, France won the World Cup with Giroud up top despite his not scoring a single goal in the seven game campaign. His contributions outside of scoring were just that important. Oh, and it is also worth mentioning that since his debut, Giroud has missed only four France matches when fit.

Obviously club football is different from international football, but the sheer magnitude of Giroud’s achievements for France cannot be dismissed. He brings valuable experience to Chelsea that is probably underrated. It is understandable why he thought about leaving last January (he wanted to make the Euro squad) but it was crucial for Frank Lampard to not only hold on to him, but find a way to adjust the tactics to include him more often.

Giroud simply makes everyone around him better. He was brought into Chelsea as an alternative option but his value exceeds that. Imagine what the likes of Tammy Abraham, Mason Mount, Reece James, Fikayo Tomori and more are learning from the striker. Chelsea’s leadership and experience have both largely been internal since the old guard of Didier Drogba, Frank Lampard, Ashely Cole, John Terry, and Petr Cech departed.

It may be hard to convince Giroud to stay around much longer than this season. Maybe he sees the Euros as his international swan song. But, given the evidence, he might find that his international and club career both extend far longer than anyone expected.