Even with the quality of players that we have, they're an extremely hard side to break down and once they get on top of you, you find it difficult to stem the flow of attacks.

When I came to Chelsea from West Ham there were certain parts of my game I felt I needed to improve and I like to think now that I have shown dramatic improvement.

Footballers do get a hard time, and there is a lot of generalization going on. When you get to meet players and know them as lads, it's always a bit different.

I never relax on the year before. Every year I want to get more out of myself so I use it as a driving force, rather than a pressure thing.

I loved reading Roald Dahl when I was young but I had forgotten a lot about the books. I read the 'BFG' on the iPad the other day and it was so interesting to see his descriptions of clothes and places.

I'm a very private person, and you have a lot of people looking into your personal life, away from football. That's the one thing that I don't like, but I always remember how lucky we are that we're playing football.

When I was at school, I wanted to be a lawyer.