CHELSEA CAN ATTRACT BEST PLAYERS IN THE WORLD CHAMPIONS LEAGUE FOOTBALL

Chelsea interim manager Guus Hiddink believes Chelsea should be formulating their summer transfer plans now and insists a lack of Champions League football next season will not necessarily affect their ability to attract their top targets.

"If you look at the other [Premier League] teams getting even more possibilities economically to make their squads strong [with the forthcoming TV deal], then you must form now -- and I'm sure they are doing it -- [plans] to be very competitive next year," Hiddink said.
"The club must also offer the ambition [to players] even when you don't play in the Champions League next year. It's difficult but if the club with its big status can offer ambition into the future, then the club will stay attractive."
"It's not a success but it's not a failure," he added. "Success is when we go on and get to the finals of both cups. That would be a huge success and it's not easy. When I started here failure would have been if from December until now we had several defeats, which is not true. I hope we can go into Springtime and achieve what this club wants to achieve."