BEWARE!!!!!!

Back2Back
By 40 Years A Blue
May 15 2006

Finally. After weeks, ney months of press and media speculation, Michael Ballack completed his transfer from Bundesliga Champions Bayern Munich to Back to Back Premiership Champions Chelsea today on a free transfer and is on a reported weekly wage deal of £130,000 for the next three years.

Nice money if you can get it.

Ballack. Take this bit of advice. Two years ago you dived at The Bridge to earn your side a penalty in the Champions League. If you wear the Blue shirt with pride and go about your game with honesty and integrity and you will have no problem, but I suspect that although the Chelsea players will welcome you they would not have forgiven you! Beware!!!

Jose was full of pride and beaming with delight at this afternoon's press conference when he announced that Ballack and Lampard would play together in midfield (as 18 Years A Blue said to me earlier, 'JM is going to have to play six across the middle to keep them all happy.' Glad its JMs problem not mine LOL).

Mourinho said, "How will this signing affect Lampard and the team? It will affect them a lot because Lampard wants top players to play with him and the team wants top players to improve the very good team we have.

"So as a coach I look forward to working with them and my intention is to play both Lampard and Ballack together and try to extract the best they can give to the team. We are champions and to improve champions, we need champions."

With lots of speculation about Ballack going to Man Utd or any other club in the Premiership, Ballack took his chance to explain the situation. He said "For me I have had a dream of playing abroad from the age of 22 to 23," he said. "It was a question of where would I go and when would I go.

"Then I had my moves from Kaiserslauten to Bayer Leverkusen and finally to Bayern Munich so I didn’t move abroad then. Money I can earn in any league, I earn well in Germany, so that’s not the main reason I’m moving.

"The main reason is the challenge to come and play in England. Earlier days I thought about playing in the sun, but in recent times it has become clear that the Premier League is one of the strongest leagues in the world. You can see the achievements of Arsenal and Liverpool in the Champions League the last two seasons and Chelsea’s dominance was also attractive.

"They gave me the chance to play here. It wasn’t 100 per cent sure that I would play here if I wanted to. That was Chelsea’s decision.

"Man United came in quite early for me," he revealed. "But really I saw the possibilities at Chelsea being much greater - a stronger team - and also London has its attractions as a family man. In the final analysis, Chelsea’s aims for the coming years are what attracted me."

It seems that the German press had made allegations that Ballack demanded a GUARANTEED first team place, whether the following is for his new team-mates or the press, or just total 'Barry Hollocks' I will leave it to you to make your own mind up ( I have made up mind), Ballack said "There is no such thing as a guarantee, that has never been the case. Whenever I’ve moved, I’ve never made that demand.

"There will obviously be competition. Chelsea have top midfielders like Frank Lampard, Joe Cole, Claude Makelele and as a player that is good for me. I am looking forward to the challenge. I want to play and I think this challenge will help me develop as a player.

"I’ve spoken to José Mourinho and I am quite flexible. I can play at the back of midfield or at the front of midfield and José knows my strengths and the goals I score from midfield positions."

40 YEARS A BLUE!

BACK-TO-BACK CHAMPIONS!