Cole puts boss on defensive

Roberto Di Matteo’s Friday press conference was, yet again, interrupted. The Chelsea officials wanted to make the kind of statement they hoped would kill off any further controversy or questioning for the day.

“Ashley [Cole] co-operated at all times with the FA and stands by the evidence that he gave and does not accept the criticism that has been made.”

Quite.

Because, the only problem for Chelsea was that, just moments before, Cole himself had already expressed his feelings on the FA’s report via Twitter.

And, as word quietly but quickly spread around the media room at the club’s Cobham training base, there was nervous anticipation about whether it would visibly register with the under-siege press officer or it would be up to someone to put the question to Di Matteo.

By that point, the press conference had already been fraught, bordering on theatrical.

On normal days, Di Matteo is notorious for his dryness. Usually, the blandest questions are blanked.

At a club like Chelsea though, there aren’t too many normal days. And, with the written judgment of the John Terry case just published, yesterday certainly wasn’t one of them.

Understandably, Di Matteo and Chelsea initially attempted to douse a difficult situation by insisting that, with Terry’s right to appeal, they wouldn’t be commenting on an “ongoing process”.

Even then though, for the first six minutes of the press conference, you could sense the unease and pressure.

Without exactly committing himself, Di Matteo was trying to tactfully explain the context of any selection policies in the immediate future.

“From my judgment on this man [Terry], I’ve known him for many, many years, since we played together. I have never had any doubt about the fact that his comments would be of any discrimination against any other ethnic party... we have to wait until the process is finished. Until then, he is available to play.”

Then, however, with one hastily written tweet, Cole somehow made a difficult situation a whole lot worse. The press conference eventually followed suit.

First, the question was put to Chelsea’s media officer.

Is it appropriate that Ashley is tweeting in the manner that he’s tweeting?

“I would say not.”

Then came a grilling for Di Matteo.

Robbie, are the players out of control? If Ashley can tweet, at 12.51, “hahaha, well done #fa I lied did”... and then make a reference to a swear word, are your players out of control?

“We’ll look at the tweet and then we will see. I don’t think the players, apart from this, are out of control.”

Would you consider someone for selection who referred to your organisation as, forgive my swearing, a bunch of twats?

“I think that’s not for me to answer.”

It seems, however, that Cole is going to have to answer to the club. Despite the left-back deleting the tweet and then apologising, he may face discipline for breaching policy.

Otherwise, Chelsea are resolutely backing both Cole and club secretary David Barnard, after the duo’s evidence came in for severe criticism in the FA’s report.

And, in the midst of all this, there is, of course, a match against Norwich today. This, at the least, is one aspect of the job that has been rather easy for Di Matteo of late.

His team are unbeaten and three points clear at the top of the Barclays Premier League, with only Daniel Sturridge doubtful.

“It would be nice to talk about football, you know,” Di Matteo insisted.

Quite.