Ian Wright and Frank Lampard were full of praise for Noni Madueke after his impressive performance vs Bournemouth yesterday.
Chelsea beat the Cherries 3-1 yesterday to give Frank Lampard his long-awaited first win back as Blues boss and despite not scoring, Madueke was a shining light for his side, causing Matias Vina all sorts of issues down the right wing for the 76 minutes he was on the pitch.
The 21-year old was given his second consecutive start under Lampard yesterday following his impressive showing in the 3-1 defeat to Arsenal on Tuesday where he bagged his first goal for the club and the former Chelsea midfielder had only positive things to say to the club’s Youtube channel about the young winger.
“Noni was very sharp, considering he was not so well on Wednesday, Thursday. He trained yesterday.
“I thought he was really good against Arsenal in a tough game and got his goal. And again today [vs Bournemouth], he’s got a fantastic one-on-one ability to go past people. I like him as a lad, he’s got really good energy.
“He will know that because he’s hungry, and I want that. It’s been a breath of fresh air, him coming in and he’s training well to deserve that.”
The praise didn’t end there though, with former Arsenal and England striker Ian Wright saying on Match of the Day last night that once Madueke works on his end product, he’ll become a real handful.
“I think today he made the difference. Frank started him at Arsenal and said the reason why he put him in was because of how hard he’s been working in training to try to get that consistency to try to get himself in the team, and he’s done it.
“He was very, very good today, gave Vina a lot of problems. The problem with him though, is his final ball. He holds it for too long and he’s going to have to learn quickly to make better decisions in that instance.
“He’s got this kind of ability to go past people and as time goes by he will feed it into the box, he’ll start to get that in his game, and once he does, Chelsea will have a real prospect on their hands.”
With the pressure off Chelsea now as they have nothing to play for, Maduueke will hope for more starts between now and the end of the season so he can prove he should be Chelsea’s starting winger for years to come.
More must-reads: