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News
‘I keep saying it’… Bobby Zamora says defender Chelsea sold for £7m was the best player he ever faced
Bobby Zamora has named former Chelsea star, Ricardo Carvalho, as the best player he has ever faced.
Zamora has played against the best of the best during his career. He played during what was a golden era of Premier League football and he saw them all from Steven Gerrard to Wayne Rooney to Rio Ferdinand.
However, Zamora maintains that Carvalho is the best player he’s ever come up against, praising the Portuguese star for his frustrating style of defending and ability to draw fouls from opposition attackers who were trying to outmuscle him.
Carvalho the best
Zamora spoke on about the defender and how good he was before his move to Real Madrid.
“The best player you played against?” Zamora was asked.
“Carvalho, I keep saying it for Chelsea. He wasn’t the biggest or the strongest guy in the world, but he had an Italian defending style. He would pinch you, pull your shirt. You’d take your eye off the ball because he’d clip your ankles. Not when you’re on the ball, just as you’re walking he’s tripping your ankles. You’re always looking to see where he is opposed to where the ball is. You’ll get frustrated, you’ll give him an elbow and you’ll get a yellow card and that’s you done for the day,” Zamora said.
What a player
Carvalho may not get the credit that someone like John Terry or even Gary Cahill gets at Chelsea, but make no mistake about it, he was a world-class defender.
Carvalho was just a nightmare to play against. No matter how big, strong or fast you were, the Chelsea ace would always give you a tough time.
It’s no coincidence that Carvalho was a massive part of the Chelsea team that conceded just 15 goals in a league season – a record that, in all honesty, may never be broken.
Carvalho was the perfect Jose Mourinho defender around that time, and we can imagine many strikers would agree with what Zamorea is saying here.