Chelsea in Fulham jibe

14 April 2012

Chelsea director Paul Smith has made a jibe at rivals Fulham ahead of tonight's Carling Cup clash.

Smith, a speaker at the annual Soccerex conference in Dubai, was asked whether Russian tycoon Roman Abramovich was only in it for fun as a hobby he would one day discard.

Smith said: "For Mr Abramovich it is certainly not a hobby. Fulham is more like an example of that."

Frank Lampard, meanwhile, looks set for a rare rest tonight as Jose Mourinho shuffles his pack. Lampard has only been out of the starting line-up for two of Chelsea's matches this season, the Carling Cup ties against West Ham and Newcastle.

And he seems likely to start the quarter-final with Fulham on the substitutes' bench as head coach Mourinho rotates his squad to keep them fresh.

However, captain John Terry, who was rested for last week's Champions League match against Paris Saint-Germain, looks likely to start alongside Alexei Smertin and Glen Johnson.

Chelsea's assistant manager Steve Clarke believes the more matches they play the better it is for their blue-chip squad.

Clarke said: "It's good to have plenty of matches because we can give most players a game and keep them fit and fresh."

Chelsea beat Fulham 4-1 at Craven Cottage in the Premiership two weeks ago but Clarke said: "I saw that Chris Coleman wasn't happy after their weekend defeat by Blackburn and gave his players a kick up the backside. They will be doing everything they can to turn the tables on us tonight but the lads are confident.

"The team which Jose put out against West Ham earlier in the competition was a pointer to how seriously he takes this."

With striker Didier Drogba fit again and certain to be involved at some stage, the only player unavailable tonight is injured centre-half Robert Huth.

Eidur Gudjohnsen, who may make way for Drogba, believes Chelsea will be deadly serious tonight, even treating the game like a Champions League tie. He said: "The Carling Cup's hardly an annoyance and we showed that when we beat Newcastle in the last round - we really wanted to win.

"We're in the competition to win it. There's lots of different opinions on that cup but we take it very seriously. It's no different to the Champions League. The manager's made it clear to everyone in the dressing room that we must beat Fulham. We go into every game to win it and the manager's given that message very clearly.

"We're only two games away from a cup final and any final is always a great day. We've put the 4-1 win behind us and it'll be a different game. We'll be really up for it." Gudjohnsen insists Chelsea's players are paying little attention to Arsenal's problems ahead of their Premiership clash at Highbury in a fortnight.

He added: "We're not looking at Arsenal too much and just concentrating on our own game. We're always thinking about the next game and won't even think about Arsenal until a few days before the game.

"We've got so many games this season and there's so much pressure on us to win every game."

Fulham v Chelsea, Craven Cottage, tonight, 7.45pm (live on Sky Sports 2)

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