Chelsea have moved to tie their key stars to long-term deals as
fears mount that Jose Mourinho will leave the club at the end of
the season.
Although chief exectuive Peter Kenyon has denied newspaper reports
that this will be Mourinho's third and final year in west London,
negotiations are already underway to tie a host of Stamford Bridge
players to 'golden handcuffs' deals to stop them leaving with the
Portuguese next summer.
"My question is 'Why would he want to go?', and I don't think he
does," Kenyon protested when asked about Mourinho's future. "We are
chasing ghosts thinking he is going to ride off into the sunset.
Where else is he going to go?"
Such public confidence belies private fears that, whatever
Chelsea's wishes, Mourinho will not be at Stamford Bridge next
season. And that has manifested itself in Chelsea's latest attempts
to extend the contracts of their key personnel, with the club
reduced to stating during negotiations that they 'hoped' the
manager would be in place next August, but 'they were not in a
position to guarantee that.'
Worried that Mourinho will attempt to take his players with him if
he does leave for pastures new in the summer, Chelsea have been
swift to offer massively improved contracts to their biggest
names.
Despite having over a year and a half remaining on his deal, Didier
Drogba has seen his wages more than double to over £90,000-a-week
in exchange for his commitment to the club until 2010.
'Also elbowing for space at a crowded west London negotiating table
are Chelsea's two English figureheads. John Terry and Frank Lampard
are set to be upgraded to the same £121,000-a-week terms that
brought Michael Ballack and Andriy Shevchenko to the club in the
last transfer window,' reports The Sunday Times.
Michael Essien is also in line for a massive pay-rise - despite
already being on one of the longest contracts at the club. Chelsea
have indicated that his wages will also exceed the £90,000-a-week
barrier.
While such deals seem unnecessary with so long remaining on the
players' contracts, and while they further embarrass Kenyon's
prediction that the club would be able to survive without vast
handouts from Roman Abramovich by 2010, the Chelsea hierarchy feel
they are necessary to prevent bids for those players from whichever
new club Mourinho finds himself at next summer.
Such deals are in stark contrast to those offered to William
Gallas. Mourinho complained this week that "I did my best to try
and keep him at the club," - an admission seen in some quarters as
a criticism of Kenyon's tough bargaining.
Mourinho also spoke for the first time about an apparent
willingness to leave the club if his contract was paid off, saying
of Abramovich: "The day he doesn't respect me, just give me the
cheque and send me home."
The Portuguese has threatened to resign twice during his tenure at
Stamford Bridge. The first time, in April 2005, he was angry that
the club had failed to support him in his disciplinary dispute with
UEFA. Then, at the end of last season, Mourinho admitted "a couple
of times during the season, I thought about closing the door and
saying goodbye."
Chelsea's solution then was to offer their manager a £5.2m-a-year
contract extension - a policy they are repeating with his players
as fears over the inevitability of his departure grow.
