Rio Ferdinand told BT Sport bosses there needed to be a quick change ahead of their live coverage of Real Madrid ’s clash with Chelsea.
The Blues head to the Spanish capital as major underdogs thanks to their desperate struggles in the Premier League. Frank Lampard will be the third different manager in the Chelsea dugout for a Champions League clash following the sackings of Thomas Tuchel and Graham Potter.
It didn’t start well for the club’s record goalscorer either, losing the first match of his second spell 1-0 at Wolves. A trip to face the European champions has hardly come at the perfect time then, although the two-time winners have been significantly better in this competition.
They will need everything to go their way in Madrid however and the BT punditry team were taking no chances of putting any bad vibes to Lampard’s side. Ferdinand posted a video on his social media explaining that those in charge of the production had placed their pitchside table directly in front of the Real Madrid crest on the floor.
The Manchester United legend took to Twitter and along with ex-Chelsea star Joe Cole, refused to stand in front of the cameras. “I think we need to have a conversation here Coley…what are they asking us to do mate?”
Cole then stopped in his tracks to avoid standing on the badge, as a sign of respect to the Spanish champions. “They’re asking us to stand on the Real Madrid bage. You can’t do that man!” Ferdinand added.
“This is where we meant to stand,” Ferdinand said as he pointed at the table in front of the badge. “We need to speak to the floor manager and have a word, we can’t do that. We’re going to roll it up so we don’t stand on the badge.”
Cole then joked they didn’t “want to poke the bear” with any signs of disrespect before kick-off. “You don’t poke the bear, this guy is right. He’s scared,” Ferdinand joked before he and Cole cracked up laughing.
The incident came 24 hours after Joao Cancelo opted to not stand on Manchester City ’s badge as he made his first return to the club. The Portuguese youngster was back in Manchester following his loan move to Bayern Munich in the January window.
And despite fans booing his introduction to the action, Cancelo went out of his way to show his parent club are still important to him.
Lampard named a team packed with Champions League experience, with Thiago Silva, N’Golo Kante and Ben Chilwell coming into the line-up. Speaking on the eve of the game Lampard urged his players to show their leadership qualities in the cauldron of the Bernabeu.
“There is no point in being called a leader until you show why and how you do it on the pitch,” Lampard said. “We have a lot of players who have a lot of titles so we can’t call ourselves completely young because if I go through the squad I can see a lot.”
