Chelsea Football Club News

• Nickname:Blues
• Founded:1905
• Manager:Roberto Di Matteo

• Ground:Stamford Bridge
• Capacity:42,440

Jose explains Robben absence

22 Jul 2007 - 11:25:23

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Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho has again played down talk of a move away from the club for Arjen Robben, after the Dutch winger missed the high-profile friendly against LA Galaxy.

Robben has been repeatedly linked with Real Madrid this summer, although Mourinho is adamant that he does not want to sell the left-winger, who is carrying a knee injury.

However, the Portuguese had to comment on Robben again after John Terry scored the only goal of a game that saw David Beckham make his debut for the Los Angeles outfit.

Mourinho said: "Robben is injured. He's here and he's flying home with us, not to Madrid."

Of the game as a whole, Mourinho added: "They gave us a hard game. The result could have been different because we had the chance to score more goals, but in pre-season I prefer matches with difficulties than easy matches.

"They played against us with belief, with big concentration and defensively very well, but I'm happy with the game. We won the match as we wanted to do. We played for about an hour in 4-4-2, which is a method I want to use.

"We played for the last half an hour with three defenders which was an experience I wanted them to have, because during the season we'll have some matches where we must play like this."