Chelsea midfielder and captain of the Nigeria national team, John Obi Mikel has declared that club boss, Antonio Conte has made a huge impact since arriving the club in the summer, noting however that the Italian shouts a lot at training.
Mikel is yet to feature for Conte after representing and winning Nigeria’s only medal at the Rio 2016 Olympics, but he believes the Italian’s influence is already taking hold at Chelsea’s training ground.
The midfielder who joined Chelsea over a decade ago is meeting his 13th manager and is confident the former Juventus and Italy coach is good enough to bring back success after a poor campaign last season.
He told Goal, “I can only see Chelsea winning trophies with this guy and hopefully we can achieve that.
“The manager knows what he wants, we are behind him, we support him as players and we have to go with him, so I think that everyone is looking forward to this season.
“It is going to be a very interesting season with the likes of Manchester City, Arsenal, Liverpool, Everton, everyone has spent a lot of money and it is going to be very difficult.
“We want to be, at the end of the season, on the top and, if we can win it, why not [go for it].”
In their next Premier League, Chelsea will be up against champions Leicester City, The Blues recorded the worst title defence in Premier League history by finishing tenth.
But Mikel thinks Conte’s passion is having a positive effect on turning around their bad form and lack of belief from last season.
The 29-year-old added, “Yes, [Conte] shouts a lot in training.”
“In games I don’t even need to say, you can see how passionate he is and how passionate he is about winning, it is just the passion he has for the game and the way he thinks that he can get his message across to the players on the pitch.
“Sometimes the manager needs to communicate with the players even when they are on the pitch, to do what he needs them to do. I have never seen anyone that passionate, but yes, he is very, very passionate about winning games.”
Mikel, who is Chelsea’s second longest-serving player after John Terry, hopes to break back into the first team upon his return.
He said, “I think it is probably more than 10 managers? 11 managers, or 12 maybe, I think so [laughs].
“But yes, Antonio is a really lovely guy. I have spoken to him a few times now and the person you see on the touchline is the person you see totally outside the football pitch, he is a nice person.
“A lovely guy to talk to and he listens to what you say. I don’t think any player has a problem telling him how they feel because I think he listens quite a lot and I think it helps that he also played football and he knows what we go through and players like to be listened to sometimes, and I think that Antonio does that really well.
“One thing for sure is that you have to work for him and there’s no getting away with that. You have to put in your best in training, you have to run and run and run, and tactics is what he believes in. I think everyone is going with that and we will see at the end of the season where we finish.”
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