Whilst he is now enjoying success with Paris FC, who currently sit fourth in the Ligue 1 table, Liam Rosenior nevertheless had a very difficult start to the year. Appointed as manager of Chelsea FC in January, replacing Enzo Maresca, the Englishman endured a tough few months in charge of the London club.

“It was the best experience of my life, and the hardest too. It was fantastic, even though it only lasted four months,” recalled the 42-year-old manager, who was sacked in April after 23 matches in charge of the Blues, in an interview with So Foot. However, whilst he has fond memories of the experience of managing such a club, Rosenior is still left with a bitter taste regarding the behind-the-scenes aspects of his time at Stamford Bridge.

“I don’t want to go into details now; I’ll talk about it one day, when the time is right. But in a country where tolerance is an important value, what happened there has nothing to do with football.“

Rosenior takes aim at the media

“I know, I answered without answering it. Actually, the moment that worried me the most was at the beginning, when we went through that five-game winning streak,” he explains.

“Any club would have been happy with such a run, but not Chelsea. You get good results and you’re in the spotlight. Then, there was a kind of snowball effect in the media. They made fun of those instructions I gave Garnacho on a scrap of paper when we were down to 10 men against PSG. The clothes I wore became a joke, the way I spoke too. I’m not a joke! You’re the first people I’m talking to about this, and probably the last for a long time, but one day, I’ll tell you what really happened.”

After losing to Arsenal in his second match in charge of Chelsea, Rosenior went on to lead his team to five consecutive wins, including a fine performance away at Napoli in the Champions League. Whilst his results were mixed in the weeks that followed, it was in March that they really began to deteriorate, with the Blues suffering seven defeats in eight matches before their manager’s departure.