Mourinho hails Arsenal hero as a ‘great player’

Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho has hailed the club’s new summer signing and former Arsenal skipper Cesc Fabregas as a ‘great player’.

Fabregas joined Chelsea on a five-year-contract earlier this week from Spanish giants Barcelona. Arsenal had the option of exercising the buy-back clause to re-sign their former player, who served the club for eight years and rose to the pedestal of cult-hero, but they refused to do so allowing Chelsea to take the full advantage of signing a world class midfielder.

Jose Mourinho, who somehow shared a love-hate relation with Fabregas, has showered heaps of praise on the Spaniard. “Cesc is a great player who adds a new dimension to our team,” he said as quoted by Marca. 

And precisely that is the only reason why he moved quickly to sign him, when it became clear that Barcelona are not keen on keeping him at the club, as Chelsea needed an experienced and a top class midfielder to replace club legend Frank Lampard, who left the club last month following the expiry of his contract.

“He’s different from Matic, Ramires and Oscar. With him we have a comprehensive central midfield. I wanted a midfielder with a certain style and now I have him.”

Fabregas can play as a central midfielder, attacking midfielder and in the false nine role as well. Mourinho will probably use him as a central midfielder where he’ll be asked to sprinkle passes all over the park and join the attack at every possible opportunity.

I personally think Arsenal have made a mistake here by refusing to match his buy-back option. There is always a room for world class players in any squad. Famous Arsenal blogger Arseblog sums up the situation nicely:

“A rival takes a player who many of us have a strong emotional connection to, and they do so with an alacrity and decisiveness that’s too often lacking from our transfer business. It’s easy enough to understand why people are annoyed.”