Chelsea manager José Mourinho has revealed that defender Ashley Cole is close to returning to full training, but he does not want to reveal if the former Arsenal man will be recalled to the first-team when he comes back to the squad.

After being first-team regular throughout his career, Cole is finding himself as a backup to Azpilicueta, who is a right back played out of position. It is widely expected that Cole will leave Chelsea at the end of the season. He has been used sparingly in the second half of the campaign after committing several mistakes in the first.

Ahead of Norwich’s visit to play Southampton, Norwich city defender Robert Snodgrass has increased the pressure on Southampton’s young defender Luke Shaw by claiming that he would rather take Ashley Cole to the World Cup 2014.

The 18-year-old has been regarded as the latest sensation in Premier league football with several club like Chelsea and Manchester United ready to pay in excess of £ 25 million for the left back. This would make him one of the most expensive left back in the world.

Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho has backed Ashley Cole and said that he is in the best form of his life and should definitely make it to the England squad which will go for the World Cup in Brazil. He insisted on the fact that Ashley deserves a place in the squad because of his recent form and it would be really bad if he is not there in the team.

It looks like Ashley Cole’s Chelsea career is not too far away from getting over. The contract of the veteran left back at Stamford Bridge will end next summer and according to the reports, the club management is not interested at all in handing him a contract extension.

Cole who has been a member of the Chelsea squad since more than 7 years now has already played 225 Premier League matches for his current club. But, in this season, he has been ignored in favour of the young Spaniard Cesar Azpilicueta.

Ashley Cole doesn’t have any plans to make a move away from Stamford Bridge during the upcoming mid-season transfer window.

He wants to remain at Chelsea and is hoping that he gets a contract extension in the second half of the ongoing season.
Cole’s form of late has been quite poor and he hasn’t been named even in the match day squads of Chelsea in some of their recent games.

Manchester City has to face Chelsea in an away Premier League game this weekend and they might have to go into such a vital game without their skipper Vincent Kompany.

Kompany has not completely recovered from his groin injury because of which he has been out of action since the last 20 days or so. However, his fitness is still being assessed and it hasn’t been officially announced that he would not be playing in that Chelsea game.

Ashley Cole might not be able to feature for England in their upcoming two World Cup qualifiers against Montenegro and Poland respectively as he discovered a rib injury while playing for his club Chelsea in the match against Norwich City yesterday.

Ashley Cole is an English professional football player who currently plays for London club Chelsea and is also the regular left back for the England national team.

According to many football writers, critics, fans as well as his fellow professionals, Cole is seen as one of the best left backs of his generation and is seen as an able protégé for the Brazilian legend Roberto Carlos who made the term ‘marauding wing back’ a reality in modern football.

Chelsea goalkeeper Petr Cech is regarded as one of the best in the Premier league, and he is right up there when it comes to the best in the world as well. He was one of the first signings made by Chelsea manager José Mourinho when he took charge of the club in his first spell.

Back in the 1980s few people would have predicted that football would not just remain one of the most popular leisure activities into the digital era, but would actually grow in popularity throughout this time.

Back then the game was bedevilled with problems, with violence between fans and disasters such as Heysel and Hillsborough, which meant that the game had a pretty low reputation and crowds at the matches appeared to be irrevocably in decline. So how has football recovered to the extent that it is now one of the biggest entertainment industries in the world?