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Lampard shuts down Saliba and Gabriel comparison to iconic Chelsea duo

Chelsea legend Frank Lampard quickly shot down any comparisons of Gabriel and William Saliba to iconic Blues pairing John Terry and Ricardo Carvalho.

With the duo's success in Arsenal's defence, it's inevitably led to comparisons with some of the Premier League's most iconic centre-back partnerships like Nemanja Vidic and Rio Ferdinand, Martin Keown and Tony Adams as well as Terry and Carvalho.

However, Lampard does not believe Saliba and Gabriel come close to Chelsea's rock-solid defensive pairing.

When asked during Amazon Prime's pregame coverage of Arsenal against PSG if Saliba and Gabriel were comparable to Terry and Carvalho, Lampard responded: 'No. Not yet.

'If they go and win two or three Premier Leagues and a Champions League, then maybe you can compare them.

'I'm not putting them down. They are fantastic and growing all the time. It's not fair to make that comparison because this is all ahead of them.

'But at this point, no. But what they're doing at the minute is great things.

During their time together at Chelsea, Terry and Carvalho won three Premier League titles, three FA Cups and two League Cups.

The pair were also at the heart of a Blues backline that shipped just 15 goals across a full Premier League season in 2004-05.

'I was talking to him from the beginning and after we enjoyed ourselves; we had a very good relationship together and we started to know each other quickly,' Carvalho said.

During their time at Chelsea, Terry and Carvalho won three Premier League titles

'Sometimes we didn't even need to speak, it was just about looking at each other and I knew what he was going to do.

'He knew that I liked to cover, I knew that he liked to fight for the first balls, so it was automatic. Those are the kind of things you feel and it is difficult to explain in words.'

Terry and Carvalho's partnership was broken up in August 2010 when the Portuguese international voiced his desire to join Jose Mourinho at Real Madrid.

As for Terry, he remained at Stamford Bridge until 2017 when he brought an end to his 19-year stay at the club and moved to Aston Villa on a one-year deal before retiring in October 2018.

Source: dailymail.co.uk

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