Frank Lampard says N’Golo Kante is “invaluable” in big games for Chelsea and France (./BBC)
Frank Lampard claims the only ‘problem’ he had with N’Golo Kante at Chelsea was trying to prevent the midfielder from running too much in training.
Lampard spent 18 months working with Kante at Chelsea before being sacked and replaced by Thomas Tuchel at the end of January.
Kante suffered a hamstring injury in Lampard’s first season at Stamford Bridge, but since recovering the World Cup winner has once again established himself as an integral part of the Chelsea midfielder.
Lampard described Kante’s contribution as “invaluable” and admits that the only downside to managing the 30-year-old is having to be strict with the effort he puts in during training sessions.
“When I got to Chelsea he hadn’t played so regularly for a few seasons because everyone relied on him so much, he had an injury that brought him to my first season, we missed him a lot” , did he declare. Lampard told BBC Sport.
“You seriously miss N’Golo in big games because he’s a big game player. No one will want to play against him because of his qualities.
Frank Lampard says he needed to keep a close watch on N’Golo Kante’s effort levels in Chelsea training (.)
“In these big matches, finals, football tournaments, players like N’Golo are priceless.
“The main reason he’s so good is that he’s the best in the world as a destroyer. When I say destroyer, I mean recovering the ball. To retrieve the ball with its anticipation, to have the speed necessary to achieve tight and close distances, its main attribute for me is destruction, leaving areas to retrieve the balls.
“An old-fashioned midfielder you think would be sitting in front of all four defenders, Makelele did it so well years ago for Chelsea.
“But he’s got so much more to his game. When you see the distances he travels to get past people, that acceleration and that speed, it’s something special to him, it’s really unique.
‘I asked a lot [about playing him as a strict defensive midfielder], I felt like he had so many attributes that were more than that, I was holding it back and saying, “please sit there”.
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“You have to allow N’Golo to travel with the ball, he can find passes that I think people don’t give him credit for, his close control in tight areas is also fantastic.
“He can do several jobs at the same time. He makes the people around him better, he helps everyone.
“He’s exactly as you’d expect from the outside, nothing is an act, he’s very humble, very calm, he doesn’t want a lot of conversations.
“The problem I found with him more than anything was trying to hold him back in training because every day you train and you leave him off leash in an opposite session he does, and you have to try. to remove it because he can just put this outlet in whatever he does.
“He’s amazing, he’s exactly what you see from the outside.”
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