As Chelsea lurch towards the end of one of their most embarrassing seasons this century, two players they were happy to discard will on Wednesday battle for a place in the Champions League Final.
When Olivier Giroud left for AC Milan in the wake of Chelsea’s 2021 Champions League triumph, nobody – perhaps not even Giroud himself – would have expected the Frenchman to reach another Final before the Blues did.
Yet Giroud, who turns 37 in September, is a mainstay of the seven-time European champions, who are chasing their first Champions League since 2007, a year after breaking an 11-year drought to win the Serie A title.