Chelsea midfielder and captain of the Nigeria national team, John Obi
Mikel has declared that club boss, Antonio Conte has made a huge impact
since arriving the club in the summer, noting however that the Italian
shouts a lot at training.
Mikel is yet to feature for Conte after representing and winning
Nigeria’s only medal at the Rio 2016 Olympics, but he believes the
Italian’s influence is already taking hold at Chelsea’s training ground.The midfielder who joined Chelsea over a decade ago is meeting his
13th manager and is confident the former Juventus and Italy coach is
good enough to bring back success after a poor campaign last season.He told Goal, “I can only see Chelsea winning trophies with this guy and hopefully we can achieve that.“The manager knows what he wants, we are behind him, we support him
as players and we have to go with him, so I think that everyone is
looking forward to this season.
“It is going to be a very interesting season with the likes of
Manchester City, Arsenal, Liverpool, Everton, everyone has spent a lot
of money and it is going to be
very difficult.
“We want to be, at the end of the season, on the top and, if we can win it, wh
In their next Premier League, Chelsea will be up against champions
Leicester City, The Blues recorded the worst title defence in Premier
League history by finishing tenth.
But Mikel thinks Conte’s passion is having a positive effect on
turning around their bad form and lack of belief from last season.
The 29-year-old added, “Yes, [Conte] shouts a lot in training.”
y not [go for it].”
“In games I don’t even need to say, you can see how passionate he is
and how passionate he is about winning, it is just the passion he has
for the game and the way he thinks that he can get his message across to
the players on the pitch.
“Sometimes the manager needs to communicate with the players even
when they are on the pitch, to do what he needs them to do. I have never
seen anyone that passionate, but yes, he is very, very passionate about
winning games.”
Mikel, who is Chelsea’s second longest-serving player after John Terry, hopes to break back into the first team upon his return.
He said, “I think it is probably more than 10 managers? 11 managers, or 12 maybe, I think so [laughs].
“But yes, Antonio is a really lovely guy. I have spoken to him a few
times now and the person you see on the touchline is the person you see
totally outside the football pitch, he is a nice person.
“A lovely guy to talk to and he listens to what you say. I don’t
think any player has a problem telling him how they feel because I think
he listens quite a lot and I think it helps that he also played
football and he knows what we go through and players like to be listened
to sometimes, and I think that Antonio does that really well.
“One thing for sure is that you have to work for him and there’s no
getting away with that. You have to put in your best in training, you
have to run and run and run, and tactics is what he believes in. I think
everyone is going with that and we will see at the end of the season
where we finish.”
