John Terry has echoed Liam Rosenior’s praise of Chelsea striker Joao Pedro and believes the sky is the limit for the in-form striker.
Eyebrows were raised when the Blues raided Brighton yet again in the summertime and spent £60million on a player who had impressed only sporadically during his time with the Seagulls.
The 24-year-old was parachuted immediately into the side that triumphed on the Club World Cup where he made an easy impact, scoring 3 times en path to glory.
Chelsea’s record at recruiting centre forwards has been more miss than hit in recent times, but they seem to have been bang on the cash with the Brazil international who enhanced his burgeoning fame with the 18th goal of his increasingly prolific campaign against Wrexham on Saturday.
Ahead of that FA Cup tie, Rosenior claimed he wouldn’t swap Pedro for some other striker on this planet on current form.
Aasked whether he would trade Harry Kane, Erling Haaland or Kylian Mbappe – currently Europe’s three leading goalscorers – for Pedro, and the response was emphatic.
‘I feel Joao is in that category now,’ he said. ‘Consistently within the two months that I’ve been here, he’s shown that level. He’s a world-class striker.
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‘It’s disrespectful to Erling to check him. I don’t know him rather well but what I do know from the skin is that he’s an impressive, world-class striker, but I wouldn’t swap Joao for anyone at this moment. He’s showing all the attributes I need to see in my number nine.’
Responding to Rosenior’s praise, Terry broadly agreed with the present Chelsea manager and selected to spotlight the importance of the ‘dirty work’ carried out by the Blues’ important man in attack.
He said: ‘Big praise from Liam Rosenior this week for Joao Pedro who has been in excellent forma and we’re very lucky to have him.
‘He’s scoring goals but the variability of goals he scores, he scores goals along with his left foot, he scores goals along with his head. He shows great composure one-on-one where he does that little dink over goalkeepers as well.
‘I feel goals must be on the forefront of each striker’s mind as well and he’s only going so as to add to that because the season moves on within the league, the FA Cup and in addition the Champions League.
‘I feel his link-up play has been excellent as well, it’s got higher and higher week after week and that’s only going to grow and improve as he grows and gets a little bit bit older.
‘It just allows you to hit him. We had the identical when Didier played as well. You may hit him if you’re under a little bit little bit of pressure and get yourself up the pitch and within the opposition half.
‘I like that he does the dirty work as well and there’s a very good clip of him against Brentford at home after we won the sport 2-0.
‘We lose the ball on the sting of their box around 24 minutes and he runs and sprints 80 yards to win a very good tackle on the sting of our box. A minute later he’s then scoring the goal to up us 1-0 up.
‘When strikers are prepared to do the dirty work it makes everyone else’s job a little bit bit easier and he’s often the one setting the tone in games as well.
‘I’m expecting loads more to return from him, he’s actually up there with the most effective strikers within the league this 12 months.’
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