EMOTIONAL RETURN: LIAM ROSENIOR HEADS BACK TO HULL CITY FOR FA CUP CLASH
Liam Rosenior returns to Hull City with Chelsea! Discover the emotional family story and tactical fixes ahead of the FA Cup.
Liam Rosenior is about to make an emotional trip back to Hull, and honestly, it means a lot more to him than just another match. He opened up about his late grandmother, Nanny Cath, who absolutely loved the club. She was a season-ticket holder, and Rosenior played and managed there himself; it’s all pretty close to his heart.
Chelsea kick off the FA Cup fourth round this weekend at Hull’s MKM Stadium, and Rosenior can’t shake the feeling that Nanny Cath had something to do with this draw. She’s buried less than a mile from Hull’s training ground. The whole Rosenior family is coming together for the game in Yorkshire, which doesn’t happen often.
Chelsea’s head coach wants to steer clear of an FA Cup upset, but for Rosenior, this tie is special. He talked about the first time he joined Hull: “I went there on trial, no contract, nothing. I took Nanny Cath to the local Harvester, sat her down, and told her, ‘I’m going to sign for Hull City.’ She was already a season ticket holder, so she was thrilled. Sadly, she passed away, and now she’s buried just down the road from where the team trains. When I took the Hull job, it was almost exactly a year after her funeral. You can tell this club really matters to me; I get emotional just talking about it.”
He swears there’s something else at play, maybe a little bit of help from above. “I used to visit Hull every summer as a kid, when she lived there. I went to Boothferry Park to watch games. Strangely, I’m from London, but I feel this pull to Hull. Plus, Hull is twinned with Freetown, and I’m from Sierra Leone. There are all these weird connections.”
For him and his family, this weekend is a big deal. They’ll all get together Friday night, which is rare since they live so far apart. Still, Rosenior says he’s locked in on the match and ready to give everything.
It’s a full-circle moment for him. Back in 2014, Rosenior played in the FA Cup final with Hull, only to lose 3-2 to Arsenal after extra time. Mikel Arteta was the Arsenal captain that day. “I went from being on trial at Hull to captaining them in Europe and playing in an FA Cup final. Those are the memories you want, and that’s what I want to build at Chelsea now.”
But he’s also got work to do. After Chelsea blew a 2-0 lead against Leeds and ended up drawing 2-2, Rosenior pulled the squad together the next morning at Cobham. He made them watch clips from the game, including the two goals they let in after some pretty shaky defending.
“It wasn’t just the two mistakes,” he said. “We talked about things like how we manage the game after we score and what that should look like.”
Rosenior’s determined to get things right, and he’s not wasting time. “My job is to make this team as good as possible, as fast as possible. We had a good meeting to clear things up. In football, mistakes happen. That’s just part of it. What frustrated me was that there was so much good stuff in that game, but now we’re all talking about the mistakes. The players need to know that, so next time we play like that, we’re celebrating three points instead.”
MUDRYK SPOTTED: STAR TRAINS PRIVATELY AT UXBRIDGE FC WHILE SERVING A MAJOR FA SUSPENSION
Mykhailo Mudryk is training alone! Read about his Uxbridge pitch rental, the 4-year FA ban threat, and his offensive gaming ban.
The Ukrainian international hasn't played for the Blues since their Europa Conference League win over Heidenheim back in November 2023. After joining Shakhtar Donetsk in 2023, he racked up 10 goals and 11 assists in 73 matches.
People started talking when he showed up on a football pitch this week, even though he's still suspended.
Mudryk Trains at Uxbridge FC
According to talkSPORT, Mudryk wasn’t actually training with Uxbridge. He just rented their 3G pitch and brought his own private coaching team along. The Honeycroft ground is about 40 minutes from his place, and his representatives booked it directly.
Chelsea had nothing to do with these solo sessions. Mudryk’s FA charge bans him from training or playing with the club.
If he’s found guilty, Mudryk faces a ban from football that could last up to four years. But the time he’s already spent suspended counts toward that total.
Back in December 2024, Mudryk said, “I know that I have not done anything wrong and remain hopeful that I will be back on the pitch soon. I cannot say any more now due to the confidentiality of the process, but I will as soon as I can.”
Other players like Sandro Tonali, Eric Cantona, Ivan Toney, and Luis Suarez have also received long bans.
Mudryk Banned from Gaming Too
Football isn’t the only place Mudryk’s hit a wall. In February, he got a four-week ban from the Counter-Strike 2 platform FACEIT for making offensive comments during a game.
Apparently, he made several remarks about the massacres of Poles in Volhynia and Eastern Galicia during WWII. These killings carried out by the Ukrainian Insurgent Army between 1943 and 1945 left up to 100,000 Poles dead, many of them women and children.
FACEIT’s rules say a four-week ban goes to repeat offenders, so this probably wasn’t Mudryk’s first time getting punished for his behaviour on the platform.
In a message to his fans, he wrote, “Happy New Year to all my fans. I just wanted to say thank you for your support. I see all your messages and truly appreciate them, so please don't give up on me, as I have not given up on myself. Can't wait to see you soon.”
DISCIPLINE CRISIS: WHY CHELSEA IS ON THE VERGE OF AN ALL-TIME PREMIER LEAGUE RECORD
With 10 games left, Chelsea's top-five hopes rest on fixing a disciplinary record that is the worst in the Premier League.
Chelsea manager Liam Rosenior isn’t messing around anymore. After yet another red card, this time Pedro Neto got sent off in the second half of their 2-1 loss to Arsenal. Rosenior’s patience has run out. That’s now nine red cards for Chelsea this season, which is over twice as many as any other Premier League team. Even Enzo Maresca picked one up when he was in charge.
It’s not just Neto. Marc Cucurella, Joao Pedro, and Moises Caicedo – they’ve all been sent off at some point. Chelsea’s disciplinary record has gone from bad to worse, and Rosenior’s fed up. With Neto now suspended for the big game against Aston Villa, Rosenior wants his players to get their act together and start taking responsibility.
“It needs to improve,” he told reporters on Monday. “My job is to build a culture where people own up to mistakes. If you mess up, admit it and make sure it doesn’t happen again. That goes for me too. If I pick the wrong team or make a bad call, I need to be accountable, and I expect the same from my players.”
Rosenior’s message couldn’t be clearer: sort yourselves out, or you’re out. With ten league games left and a top-five finish and a Champions League spot still within reach, Chelsea can’t afford to keep shooting themselves in the foot. They’re only two reds away from the all-time Premier League record. At this point, they could nearly field a whole team of players who’ve seen red this season.
Neto’s sending off came hot on the heels of Wesley Fofana’s red card in the draw with Burnley. Rosenior said, “You need your team-mates, but you’ve got to help yourself too. Pedro apologised to everyone, but we’re missing him on Wednesday. I need to see better behaviour, not just from Pedro, but from everyone. Too many silly bookings, too much dissent. If we’re serious about improving, we need to change this now.”
It’s not a new problem either. Chelsea finished bottom of the Premier League fair play table last season under Maresca, and they were bottom the year before with Mauricio Pochettino.
Asked how he plans to fix it, Rosenior explained he even had to sub Cole Palmer and Enzo Fernandez against Arsenal to avoid more reds. “It’s not always about punishment,” he said. “Sometimes, you have to show the value of staying disciplined. The stats don’t lie: when we keep 11 men on the pitch, our chances of winning go way up. That should be all the motivation we need.”
He knows setbacks happen, bad passes, and questionable refereeing, but he wants his players to react positively and move on. “I can’t keep losing players every couple of games. If someone can’t control themselves, I’ll have to leave them out.”
Chelsea’s running out of excuses. It’s time for the players to step up or step aside.
