NORWICH:
Chelsea captain John Terry will inevitably be the focus of attention at Norwich City today even if new signing Gary Cahill makes his debut alongside him in defence.
The game at Carrow Road is the last before Chelsea take on Queens Park Rangers in the FA Cup fourth round, which will be a rerun of the Premier League fixture that saw Terry being accused of racially abusing Anton Ferdinand.
A court case will begin four days after the cup game and Andre Villas-Boas, the Chelsea manager, found himself being quizzed on team selection unusually early this week.
“I’ll have no problem picking John,” said Villas-Boas. “He’ll have to compete against three others, but we’ll make the right decision.”
Cahill’s £7-million transfer from Bolton was completed in time for the Norwich game but Villas-Boas made no promises that he would replace David Luiz, whose performances have been erratic this season. Fourth-place Chelsea will kick off at Norwich 11 points behind leaders Manchester City despite three successive wins, two of which have been in the Premier League at the expense of Wolves and Sunderland.
The opportunity is there for Chelsea to improve their standing but Villas-Boas was not paying too much attention to the weekend’s top-billing fixtures.
“We need to find consistency in our own performances. It’ll be better if we beat Norwich but I don’t care what happens in the other matches this weekend. We need to do our job first.”
Dalglish praises ‘fantastic’ Bellamy
Meanwhile, Liverpool manager Kenny Dalglish will continue to use veteran forward Craig Bellamy sparingly over the remainder of the campaign, an indication of how important the injury-prone Welsh international is to his club’s cause.
Bellamy is certain to play some part in his team’s visit to Bolton, a game Liverpool hope will allow them to maintain the push towards a top-four finish and a place in next season’s Champions League. But it is likely to be a cameo role.
“Some players need greater management than others,” said Dalglish. “Bellamy’s fantastic in preparing for matches. But for the fitness side of it, it’s not fair on too many players at this stage of the season to be starting them every single game.”
Today’s fixtures
Norwich v Chelsea
Everton v Blackburn
Fulham v Newcastle
QPR v Wigan
Stoke v West Brom
Sunderland v Swansea
Wolves v Aston Villa
Bolton v Liverpool
Published in The Express Tribune, January 21st, 2012.
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