Mikel Obi Reveals Decision Makers At Chelsea During His Era

Chelsea and Super Eagles legend, Mikel Obi, has revealed the movers and shakers at Stamford Bridge during his days at the club.

Mikel Obi listed names like John Terry, Didier Drogba, Frank Lampard, Peter Cech, and Ashley Cole as the big names running the show in the dressing room then.

He, however, pointed out that Terry, who was Chelsea’s captain then, had the most significant say at the club, both on and off the pitch.

“I think, obviously, one man that actually absolutely did run it was John Terry”, Mikel Obi told TalkSport. “Terry was the man. In a good way. On the pitch, Terry was the man.

“Sometimes, when the dressing room was not together, he was the guy that always brought us together. On the pitch, off the pitch, he was the leader.

“Like you’ve just said, there are too many players there with big egos. The likes of Didier Drogba, Frank Lampard, Peter Cech, and Ashley Cole. You know, everyone has their opinion.

“But at the end of the day, Terry was the guy who made the decisions.”

He added, “We had the power. I think Terry, Frank, Didier – Didier was very opinionated, and had a lot of voice in the dressing room – Petr Cech, these guys were the ones who ran the dressing room.

“When they feel like ‘ok, this manager is not giving the players what we want, we’re not playing as much as we want, or not enjoying ourselves in the way we want, we’ll come together and figure out a way of getting someone in that we want.”

Mikel Obi gave an instance of when Terry ensured the sacking of Rafael Benitez, who wasn’t playing the English defender as often as he wanted.

Recall that Chelsea fired Roberto Di Matteo six months after winning the Champions League in 2012 and appointed Rafael Benítez as manager in interim.

The Spaniard, who had guided the Blues to a Europa League final and a third-place finish in the Premier League, was replaced the following season by Jose Mourinho.

When Mikel Obi was asked if Chelsea players got together to conspire to get Benitez out and whether the Chelsea players were ‘not having the Spaniard’, He said: “No, we were not.

“We made that clear. I think obviously Liverpool was a big rival for us, but coming into the club as well, I think the fans also didn’t like Rafa.

“I think there was something about Rafa and the fans that the fans didn’t take to him. Same as the players, we didn’t accept him as one of us.”

Mikel continued, “Then we had the thing with Terry where he got dropped and wasn’t playing as much as he wanted. Obviously, Terry always played and Rafa came in and was like ‘You’re not going to play every game’.

“Obviously Terry wanted an explanation, ‘why am I not played?’ and Benitez didn’t give him that.

Mikel concluded: “Terry got together by himself and decided yes, your time is gone!”