Soccer: Shut the critics up, Bates urges Chelsea stars
Chelsea chairman Ken Bates has called on the players to silence the critics following their embarrassing exit from the UEFA Cup to Israeli outsiders Hapoel Tel Aviv.
And he defended the so-called ‘Chelsea Six’ Marcel Desailly, Emmanuel Petit, Graeme Le Saux, Eidur Gudjohnsen, William Gallas and Albert Ferrer who refused to travel to Israel for the first leg because of security fears.
That first leg ended in a 2-0 defeat in Tel Aviv and a 1-1 draw last night saw Chelsea dumped out of European competition at an early stage once again.
Bates said there was only one way to rectify the situation.
‘‘We will have to recognise that we will have this Hapoel result shoved down our throats for God knows how long and so will the six players who didn’t go,’’ Bates told Chelsea’s official radio station Big Blue.
‘‘The only way of shutting up the critics is by winning games and that’s what we’ve got to do. And that’s what our strikers have got to do, stick the ball in the back of the net.’’
Bates also launched a scathing attack on the critics who have attacked the six players who chose not to travel for the first leg.
‘‘It was inevitable that once people started making a big thing about our players not going to Israel that they’d bang on and on and on about it,’’ he added.
‘‘But I think we’ve got a situation now where one or two people have started to go too far.
‘‘The club gave the players a free choice and that’s it. You can’t then say you don’t like it because you didn’t make the choice you wanted them to make.
‘‘That question’s over, that subject’s closed.’’
