"It was very nice to play for Chelsea."

Raul Meireles appeared at Cobham yesterday to say goodbye to everyone and took time out to speak to ChelseaTV about his time here and had a message for the fans.

He said:

"I came to say goodbye to my friends and of course I will miss this club and the fans and the city. There are some great people here, they always supported me and they help everyone, so of course I had to come to say goodbye to everyone.

It was a great year, The last part of the season was great, we won the Champions League, the FA Cup, and it was very good for me. I will miss these moments but it is a new challenge for me and I am ready to go to Turkey. I hope things go well for me like they did at Chelsea this year.

Thanks to the fans for their support and I will miss this club a lot, it was very nice to play for Chelsea."

(Source)

I really can't help but think that we sold Meireles a season too soon but if RDM doesn't see him as part of his plans then fair enough. We have Oriol Romeu available to step into the breach if required despite speculation about his future but as far as having experience in the big games, we could end up missing Meireles.

I have said it before and I will say it again, he always gave everything in a Chelsea shirt so I would like to say thank you Raul for doing so and playing a huge part in our Champions League success last season including a real workman like performance at the Nou Camp!

KTBFFH