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Friday 15 May 1998 Previous News 1 Next

HUNGRY VIALLI SETS SIGHTS ON PREMIERSHIP
‘Secret Of Football Is Never To Be Satisfied'
Says Chelsea Boss After Euro Joy

THERE wasn't time for much of a party. Only four hours after arriving back at Heathrow with the European Cup-Winners' Cup, Chelsea were on another plane, heading to Martinique for an end of season tournament with their player/manager warning them that the work had only just begun.

For some, Gianluca Vialli admitted, Wednesday night's glory is where the story ends. Even as his team shook hands with waiting fans at the airport, the Italian was pondering which of them would make way for a slew of summer signings designed to lift a team that finished fourth in the table to the summit of the Premiership.

The message was clear to himself and his troops - never accept what you've got; only the best is good enough. We need to improve and to win the Premier League next season, said Vialli. That is our target and I know we are capable of it. I want to win the championship, and I know it's what our players and supporters want.

We have proved ourselves in Europe, proved that we are a great team by winning two cups in one season. But we won't be seen as a great team in England unless we win the League and that won't be easy. We know we will have great challenges from Arsenal, Liverpool and Manchester United but we will be ready for them.

All the more ready when Vialli completes the strengthening work he has planned for the summer. Lazio striker Pierluigi Casiraghi and Rangers forward Brian Laudrup are all but signed already, with other players, including AC Milan's French midfielder Marcel Desailly, also targeted.

I've already won cups in England but the secret of football is never to be satisfied. If you're satisfied you won't win anything else, you have to be hungry, said the man who replaced Ruud Gullit at Stamford Bridge. You can be happy, but you must never be satisfied, so I hope I never am. When I'm satisfied is the moment I will hang up my boots and do something else.

Not for a while though, and although Vialli has found managerial life has a steep learning curve, he cannot wait for more: It's been very busy, very hard, but very exciting as well. But I also need to thank the players, because I know I've been a pain sometimes. This is football, though. People say it's only a game but sometimes it really is like life or death for me, for everybody. You try to enjoy the pressure but sometimes you can't help getting tense or nervous.

He also paid tribute to assistant manager Graham Rix, the man responsible for sending Gianfranco Zola off the bench and into history in the Rasunda Stadium: I trust Rixie very much and he never lets me down. He knows the game and his job. I'm learning every day, every day I have problems and I try to cope with them. Sometimes I do the right thing, sometimes the wrong things and Rixie lets me know. But when I get it wrong I have to do it better in the future.


CHOPPER SWINGS AT BLUES
 
CHELSEA might have won their third trophy in less than 12 months and delivered Britain's first European trophy in four years but that isn't good enough for Ron ‘Chopper' Harris. The legendary hard man, who helped the Blues lift the Cup-Winners' Cup in 1971, yesterday launched an extraordinary attack on the current team.
He claimed Chelsea would never win the Premiership, that Gianluca Vialli man of the match for many commentators had an awful final and, somewhat predictably, that the boys of '71 would have beaten this lot.
Harris, now the wealthy owner of a holiday complex in Wiltshire, said: They will never win the Premiership and only Gianfranco Zola would have got into our team. I thought Stuttgart were awful and Chelsea didn't have to beat much to reach the final in the first place. This is the easiest European competition to win.
I thought Vialli had an awful game. He seems more interested in falling over. Zola would have played over Peter Osgood in the ‘71 side but I can't see any room for anyone else.
Harris' former Chelsea team-mate Osgood, however, was a little more charitable about Vialli's achievement but also insisted the Blues' side that beat Real Madrid to lift the trophy 27 years ago would come out top against the new King's Road stars. I think ours was a better team but Dennis Wise is class, he said. He should be in the England World Cup squad. But I'm more than happy to congratulate Luca, although I have little doubt we'd have beaten this team.

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