Pre Match

PRE-MATCH BRIEFING: WATFORD V CHELSEA

Posted on: Fri 13 Feb 2009

New manager, ex coach, teams 38 league places apart. It's a rich mix for this FA Cup tie. Club historian Rick Glanvill and club statistician Paul Dutton prepare a taster.

Talking point

Ray Wilkins knows all about Watford, the team he leads Chelsea against in this fifth round tie.

By coincidence, Saturday's opponents were also the last to face a team picked by him. That was Fulham's final game of the 1997/8 season, and manager Ray saw his side slip to a 1-2 home defeat. Still, a play-off place for promotion from the second tier had been secured. But then technical director Kevin Keegan broke the news that his close friend was out of a job after eight months and that he, Keegan, was stepping into the hot seat.

Ray may find the talent at his disposal for this weekend more substantial than at Craven Cottage on 2 May 1998. Back then, he selected from the likes of Maik Taylor, Peter Beardsley and Chris Coleman, but also Mark Blake, Rufus Brevett and Paul Trollope. On Saturday evening he may become the second manager in a week to pick new loan signing Ricardo Quaresma in a line-up packed with other internationals.

KEY STAT

The Blues have reached the last 16 of the FA Cup for the 11th successive year. The longest previous sequence was six seasons, between 1965 and winning the trophy in 1970.

Ray was of course a teenage star and skipper of the Blues, but he has also taken joint charge of the first team before. He and Graham Rix were coaches under Gianluca Vialli, including for Chelsea's Uefa Super Cup win over Guus Hiddink's Real Madrid in August 1998.

They stepped up when Luca was dismissed on 12 September 2000. (Oddly enough, Gianfranco Zola was instantly made 2-1 favourite to succeed his fellow Italian even then.)

The first task Rix/Wilkins faced was galvanising a divided dressing room for the Uefa Cup first leg at home to lively Swiss team St Gallen. One challenge must have been the sudden enthusiasm of Winston Bogarde to play: 'We all have a duty to get our minds on our job,' said the Dutch defender. 'I can't wait to start my first game for Chelsea.' He would have to wait a little longer.

Christian Panucci, on loan from Inter, scored the winner on a frustrating night. Sitting in the stands that evening was Colin Hutchinson's guest, Claudio Ranieri. He was installed as manager the following day, but sat out the first game after his appointment, at home to Leicester City, when Graham Rix again picked the team, and Bogarde debuted. We lost that one 0-2. After less than a week, Ranieri brought in his own staff, and the Ricco and Ray show was over.

In May 2001 Ray linked up again with his old Chelsea pal Gianluca Vialli - at Watford, of course. We wish Ray luck against a familiar foe.

Following this important cup clash, Butch will relinquish duties to Guus Hiddink. Saturday is Valentine's Day, so will it be love at first sight for the manager-in-waiting sitting in the stands? He will become the 26th manager in our history.

The hugely experienced Netherlander will be moonlighting at Chelsea from his Russia national team job until the end of March, when they have eminently winnable World Cup qualifiers at home to Azerbaijan and away to Liechtenstein in the space of five days. It is a recognised international break and the fields of Cobham will have very few footballers training on them.

Hiddink will head back to Moscow in five weeks' time on the back of a trip to White Hart Lane and will return to host Newcastle at the Bridge, and - hopefully - prepare for a Champions League game the midweek following.