Lampard blasts Chelsea for not signiong Declan Rice as he claims he urged Chelsea to sign him first

Frank Lampard admits he urged Chelsea to re-sign Declan Rice from West Ham during his first spell in charge.

Rice is now on the brink of joining Arsenal for a British record £105m transfer fee.

But Lampard says he pushed Chelsea to bring back Rice after he was cut loose as a junior player from Cobham.

Lampard, speaking on the Diary of a CEO podcast, said: “I wanted to bring in Declan Rice.

“I was like ‘this kid is going to be the captain of Chelsea for the next 10 years’. It didn’t happen, anyway, it is hard to dissect people’s work.”