Frank Lampard Has Been Blues' Real Leader This Season

One hundred and thirty three goals in all competitions. It is a statistic as startling as it is impressive. Chelsea still have to dispatch Wigan Athletic at Stamford Bridge on Sunday to clinch their fourth English top-flight title, but that seems a formality against poor travellers, who have conceded 47 times while suffering 13 away defeats in the Premier League.
If Carlo Ancelotti's side should hit five against the fifth-bottom Latics next Sunday in clinching the Premier League title - and Roberto Martinez's men have already shipped that number or more in three league games this season - they will hit a century of Premier League goals for the campaign.
Perhaps it is a legacy of the considerable shadow that Jose Mourinho still casts over the club, but the Blues are still thought of as joyless assassins by many Premier League watchers. Their goal-happy season is a firm rebuff to this enduring perception.
Ancelotti describes himself as an advocate of attacking football, but in his Friday press briefing admitted he hadn't expected such an avalanche. "I am surprised," he said. "I didn't think this team could score so many goals. We try to play attacking football. We have a midfielder who can score 25 goals in a season, and there is nobody like this in the other teams. We don't just have great strikers, but the support from midfield as well.”
The coach couldn't have put it any more fittingly. That Ancelotti didn't even mention Frank Lampard by name epitomises the unobtrusive way that his star midfielder routinely churns out excellence. Ancelotti also praised Florent Malouda, and his emergence as a decisive player has been key to the term's success, but Lampard has led from the front, as he always since his 2001 arrival from West Ham United. Claudio Ranieri's role in keeping Chelsea competitive in the hand-to-mouth moments pre-Roman Abramovich, and his dignity as his departure was publicly mapped in his final season, are often flagged, but his purchase of Lampard is his primary legacy to the club.
Ancelotti's own sang froid has been notable amid a season of off-field controversy, and Lampard has been his on-field conduct, with John Terry also compromised on-field on a number of occasions. Lampard's smooth passing and polished all-round game is sometimes overlooked, but it's an understandable error given the unerring consistency of his finishing.
His goals have been vital; the successful penalties against Portsmouth at Stamford Bridge and on his return to Upton Park salvaged four points over the space of a few days when Chelsea's indifferent form threatened to let their title challenge slip away.
Landmarks have been routinely passed in recent weeks. The late consolation scored at Tottenham from Michael Ballack's cross was Lampard's 100th for Chelsea in the Premier League. His sublime clipped finish for the fifth against Stoke meant he reached the 20 mark in a Premier League season for the first time. The hat-trick goal of an eventual four against Aston Villa in March meant that Lampard had hit 20 in all competitions for the fifth successive season. And he now has 156 goals for the Blues in all competitions.
These figures also underline his year-on-year improvement at Stamford Bridge - he only reached double figures in a season once for West Ham, when he netted 14 back in 1999-00.
Didier Drogba has excelled too, of course, with his own strike at Anfield his 33rd of the campaign, equalling his best-ever season (in 2006-07). Lampard will turn 32 on June 20, just as Drogba did in March. In an increasingly physical sport - with the Premier League widely accepted to represent its athletic apex - the consistency of performance that these two continue to maintain is little short of phenomenal.
Lampard's stamina can only be a positive sign for England's World Cup hopes. Good news has been scarce over the past months, with Terry's well-documented struggles, the fitness worries over his replacement as captain Rio Ferdinand, and the nation wincing collectively every time Wayne Rooney goes into a challenge. With question-marks over where goals will come from if Rooney's form or fitness gives way, the presence of a senior figure of Lampard's reliability must be a relief to Fabio Capello.
Should Chelsea raise the Premier League trophy come 6pm this Sunday, no-one will deserve to get his hands on the silverware more than Lampard. His coach will know, as everyone else should, that his crucial strike against Liverpool is just the tip of a considerable iceberg.
Culled from goal.com