Ancelotti confident Chelsea can maintain form even without talisman

CARLO ANCELOTTI believes Chelsea can cope without Didier Drogba even if his calf injury sidelines him for a long time.

The Ivory Coast international was carried off in the 83rd minute of yesterday’s victory.

The victory earned Chelsea a club record of 11 straight wins, better than the one forged by Jose Mourinho, but Ancelotti was more concerned with the condition of his top striker. Drogba has now scored five goals and was unplayable against Spurs, and while the Italian is hoping the injury is nothing more than cramp, he believes they have enough in reserve to cope without him.

“We don’t know precisely what happened,” said Ancelotti. “It is too early. We will have to wait a few days. We hope it is only cramp.

“We hope tomorrow we will have a precise diagnosis of the situation. It is a calf injury, but he felt that he had cramp. If it is cramp, it is good for us.

“We have played without Didier before. He is a very important player for us, a fantastic player. I think we can play well without Didier.

“In the last game against Porto we won without Didier, and we have Nicolas Anelka, Salomon Kalou, we have Daniel Sturridge and Fabio Borini.

“Borini is a young player and we are pleased he came on for his first game in the Premier League. We have a very good academy and we want to take a young player into the first team.”

Anelka has revealed he wants to extend his contract at Chelsea and help the club lift some silverware this season. Ancelotti wants the Frenchman and Joe Cole to be the next players to put pen to paper on new deals as the club look to combat the transfer embargo placed on them by Fifa.

The 30-year-old’s contract runs out in summer 2011 but already he is setting his sights on committing himself to Chelsea.

Drogba, captain John Terry and defender Ashley Cole have already extended their stays at Stamford Bridge recently and Anelka looks likely to follow suit shortly.

“If I have the chance of course I want to finish my career at Chelsea,” he said. “I would be glad to sign a new contract. I have this season and next season left and I would be happy to sign for even longer.

“I wanted to come to a big club like Chelsea and now I am at a big club like Chelsea. I know they (Drogba, Terry and Cole) are staying at Chelsea so I need to part of this team.”

Anelka was also confident that Chelsea had a big enough squad to cope with the loss of the likes of Drogba, Michael Essien, John Obi Mikel and Salomon Kalou to the African Cup of Nations in January.

“I think that we are strong to go through the season,” he added. “We have so many big players in the squad, so even if we can’t buy any players we still have the players to do the business.

“Even if we get injuries, we are confident. If we can’t buy, we need to have a big spirit, be all together and fight until the end.

“Last season, we lost many points at home. This season we are stronger in our head. We know what we want to do.”