New Chelsea manager Andre Villas-Boas cancels first pre-season friendly with Vitesse Arnhem

Andre Villas-Boas – FC Porto (Getty Images)

Related Links

Teams

Players

New Chelsea manager Andre Villas-Boas has already shown that he is not afraid to make decisions within the club after cancelling the team’s friendly with Dutch side Vitesse Arnhem on the 9th of July.

The Portugese boss believed that it was too soon for his players to be playing a friendly as the match fell just 5 days after the players returned to training after their holidays.

With the Blues’ players due back to their Cobham training ground next Monday to start their pre-season, Arnhem recieved a call from Chelsea to say that the club would not be able to fulfill the fixture which left the Dutch outfit dissapointed at the thought of loosing an estimated 11,000 strong crowd.

Paul van der Kraan, the Vitesse managing director told the Dutch club’s official website: “We were only informed over the weekend that the game could not now go ahead, and it was too late for us to arrange for an alternative opponent of similar stature to step in.

“It is a big disappointment for our club and our supporters,” he continued.

Chelsea will also hand their own fans refunds with a view to re-scheduling the game for a later date. This will be seen as Villas-Boas first major decision made as Chelsea manager with his second likely to be the choosing of his staff.