Why England’s Brave John Terry Is The Perfect Man For The Chelsea Job Or How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love SEO

Says it all really doesn't it

Not since the abbreviation LOL was created by a tosser have three consecutive letters riled me as much as A, followed by V, ended by B. Towards the end of his reign, more people were actually laughing out loud when saying “AVB” than “LOL”. In fact, Andre Villas-Boas himself was busy LOLing by the end as he sat back, moaned, thought of the severance package he was about to get his hands on, and then moaned some more.

With Villas-Boas consigned to the Abramovich scrap heap of Big Names that can’t win Big Cups, the search is now on for someone to buck the trend. But, of course, when winning the club a league title for the first time in 50 years isn’t enough (Jose Mourinho), indeed, winning the domestic double isn’t either (Carlo Ancelotti), you’d need to be either a mercenary (Sven-Goran Eriksson), or have been out of England so long you’d forgotten what people are actually like (Rafa Benitez), to want the Chelsea job. Or maybe you’d need to be something else entirely...

Abramovich therefore seems to have quite the sense of humour, even if it is that kind that also applies to those that find X Factor auditions hilarious. So, with this common ground established, what better way to entertain the nation than to give the Chelsea job to England’s bravest man. Mourinho may have become the bookies’ favourite following the announcement that Roberto di Matteo is to take over as manager in a caretaker role until the summer, but there is only one man who fully encapsulates what Chelsea are all about. Roman, please give the job to John Terry and then let us all sit back and have a good laugh. You’ve tried enough apples. Come on now.  Give an unusually high-profile onion a shot.

For one, Terry would definitely take the job, of this there is little doubt. He is incredibly brave after all, which means that he’d rise to the challenge by saying lots of thing like ‘passion’ and ‘commitment’ and ‘the shirt’ and, perish the fucking thought, ‘the armband’. For another, Chelsea fans love him, best evidenced by their lovely “JT: Captain, Leader, Legend” banner at Stamford Bridge. And what better way to reinforce his position as a ‘legend’ by digging the club he loves out of the brown, sticky stuff and cementing them back where (they think) they belong? EBJT for player-manager then. For a start, Chelsea have form on player-managers and since the days of Roy Race, we all love player-managers, don’t we? Indeed, from between June 1993 and September 2000, Chelsea dealt exclusively with player-managers: Glenn Hoddle, Ruud Gullit and Luca Vialli.

Besides, the failed Villas-Boas experiment also highlights that Chelsea aren’t yet ready to enter a brave new post-Mourinho world by shedding the players Ray Wilkins recently insisted don’t enjoy too much power behind closed doors, when quite clearly they do: Terry himself, Frank Lampard, Ashley Cole, Didier Drogba. In which case, better stick with the age-old formula, essentially becoming the AC Milan of the Premier League with a team of veterans who have no intention of ever leaving the relative comfort of Stamford Bridge, like a shit urban version of Last of the Summer Wine, except in this version Compo has shagged Nora Batty in his Bentley and tried to get himself a superinjunction to stop Wayne Bridge finding out.

With EBJT at the helm and Mr. Wilkins as his right hand man, the fans would undoubtedly be onside a la Kenny Dalglish at Liverpool. The beauty of this is that it could just about buy them a few seasons on top of the obligatory one that Abramovich affords his manager. This is just about far-fetched enough that it could work.