Chelsea ‘open’ Frank Lampard talks as pundit makes ‘laughing stock’ claim

Chelsea have been told they will become ‘an even bigger laughing stock’ if they press on with plans to appoint club legend Frank Lampard as their manager on an interim basis.

Wednesday afternoon brought reports the Blues had opened talks with the former West Ham United and England midfielder as they look to fill the vacancy left by Graham Potter’s departure on Sunday evening. For Lampard, it would offer an opportunity to return to the role he left in January 2021 when a 18-month managerial reign was brought to a close after a series of poor results.

After a year out of the game, Lampard returned to the dugout in January last year when he took charge of Everton. After helping the Toffees preserve their Premier League status with a much-improved end to the 2021/22 season, Lampard was unable to inspire any meaningful progression from his side during the current campaign and left his position at Goodison Park in January.

However, the departure of Potter has now opened up the possibility of the Stamford Bridge legend making a return to his spiritual home and there have been reports stating he has ‘accepted’ an offer to take charge of Chelsea until the end of the season.

Former Crystal Palace chairman Simon Jordan launched a scathing assessment of the potential move just hours before news broke of the offer, stating Chelsea should ‘get on with appointing a big-name manager’.

“I think it would be laughable,’ he told talkSPORT.

“Lampard was an abject failure towards the end at Everton. The culture at Chelsea was poor towards the end. Players that have now gone like Rudiger - Frank marginalised. I think in certain quarters Chelsea are a laughing stock. Why would Chelsea want to become an even bigger laughing stock?’

“I’m sorry and Frank’s a nice fella but that’s irrelevant. Putting somebody in a dugout because it gives you some sort of popularity contest? There’s two kinds of people in this world. There’s popular people and there’s successful people and its amazing how popular you become when you’re successful and get the right people to do the right job.

Jordan continued: ‘If you bring Frank Lampard in... a) Why would Frank want to do that? It’s just diminishing of him doing everyone a favour by turning up and getting a gig. And secondly, you’ve been down that route before - maybe under a different ownership model but you’ve been there.

“Get on with appointing a big-name manager if that’s what you want to do.”