Olivier Giroud has fond flashbacks of his time with Chelsea, enough of them that in normal circumstances, Monday would be cause for a series of happy reconnections, albeit amid a backdrop of competitive hostility.
The LAFC forward and French World Cup winner takes on his former team in Club World Cup action in Atlanta (3pm ET, 8pm UK) and speaks with a smile about occasions such as big Champions League victories, or, during an interview with The Athletic last week, his goal from the 2018 FA Cup semifinal.
That particular highlight, a penalty box dance party that left half the Southampton team sprawling on their backsides before Giroud clipped the ball beyond Alex McCarthy, lights up his face. He remembers N’Golo Kanté gleefully chuckling over a goal that set the team on course for one of his three trophies during a three-season spell at Stamford Bridge.
“Oli,” Kanté joked with his trademark good nature. “I didn’t think you were capable of that.”
But while Monday will be a reunion in one sense, in another, it is anything but, which puts in stark focus how much Chelsea has changed since Giroud left for Milan in 2021.
Giroud scores against Southampton in the 2018 FA Cup semifinal (Kieran Galvin/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
“Everything is different,” he said. “From the ownership, the manager… also people working for the club, communication, marketing, not much is staying. But I hope I will see some familiar faces.”
Reece James and Trevor Chalobah remain at Chelsea from Giroud’s time, and that’s about it.
Now 38, Giroud has been impressed by how Enzo Maresca’s ultra-youthful side performed this past season, hanging on in the hunt for a Champions League spot and eventually pouncing on the fourth position as others, Nottingham Forest included, faltered at the end.
Paired with victory in the Conference League, that accomplishment bodes well, Giroud believes, even if it didn’t constitute the most spectacular haul when compared against past glories.
“You need to be patient when you get a team with a lot of young players,” Giroud said. “(The club is) producing every year more and more players. It is a good strategy, but you can’t ask them to win the best trophies straight away, you need time to build the team to get habits and link in the team. It’s a very young team, but very talented also, so we expect a really tough game.”
Giroud shakes his head as he reflects on how quickly the years have passed by. He hasn’t had things all his own way in MLS since joining LAFC last summer, so much that it took him until April this year to notch a first league goal.
With a Club World Cup opportunity looming, however, he is keen to remind an international audience that we’re not so long removed from when he was playing in the 2022 World Cup final and just over a year since he ended a profitable stint in Serie A.
Along with LAFC and former France teammate Hugo Lloris, he could have been forgiven for thinking occasions such as this, squaring off against some of the world’s best teams in games that matter, had disappeared forever. Even two months ago, that was still the case.
Lloris will also see some familiar Premier League faces (Rich Storry/Getty Images)
But then León got kicked out of the Club World Cup, FIFA announced a play-in game between LAFC and Mexico’s Club América, the MLS side won it in extra time, and here we are.
“Yeah, it’s very true, you never know what can happen in football and I am very glad that the boys can play this competition,” Giroud said. “Maybe the first time, maybe the last time they will play it, so I will try my best to have them ready for the moment and really enjoy it.
“It is kind of a World Cup but with your club, because you go into a base camp, same system. You stay in one place and then let’s see if you go through the group stage, so it is quite a big thing. For the fans, it also means a lot and we can also see where MLS stands now compared to Europe.
“We are doing this job for these kinds of games, so we just need to seize the moment and enjoy every single moment.”
As he alluded to, it is also an opportunity to cast MLS in a more positive global light, with the performances of LAFC, Inter Miami and the Seattle Sounders doubling as a referendum of sorts on the league. A signature win against a team with the profile of Chelsea would be a bold statement. Make no mistake, LAFC will go in as a sizable underdog.
Giroud insists MLS has improved a lot in the past 10 years, adding: “I know it’s not very watched in Europe, so now we have the opportunity to show what we are made of and where we stand compared with Europe.
“Club América was a great atmosphere, I loved it, it reminded me of Turkey or Greece and the crazy atmosphere,” said Giroud. However, LAFC will not have any kind of home city advantage in the tournament, with all its group games stationed outside of California. “I hope that we will have some of our fans that will travel because they are very important to us.
“We have to dream, it is the time to, but it is also the time to be focused and very demanding in every single thing we will have to do on that pitch, for 90, for 120 minutes.
“One more time, the most important thing is to say we gave everything. We don’t have any regrets and that’s most important and if they are better than us, like they should (be), shake hands and (say) thank you. I hope we will be at our maximum, really live with them in the moment.”
LAFC’s Group D campaign will continue on June 20 against Tunisia’s ES Tunis, then Brazil’s Flamengo four days later. Emerging from the group stage would be a hugely laudable achievement. In that sense, the later clashes may have even more importance, especially if Chelsea establishes a firm grip on the group.
Yet for Giroud, given his history, his memories — even with a different version of Chelsea — Monday’s game will be by far the most special.
(Top photo: Minas Panagiotakis/Getty Images)
