EPL, Premiership, English Premier League

62 year old Dutchman Guus Hiddink will be meeting Chelsea players later this week. Hiddink will have a formidable challenge ahead of him as he already coaches the Russian national team. Chelsea released a statement thanking the RFU, “The club would like to take this opportunity to thank the Russian Football Union for their understanding and cooperation.” Hiddink is currently in Turkey with the Russian team; he may watch Chelsea play in the FA Cup 5th Round this coming Saturday. He will then take charge of his first game against Aston Villa Feb. 21st.
“It’s a favour for a friend. Abramovich does so much for Russian football that I wanted to give something back. He called me personally.” Abromavich was instrumental in bringing Hiddink to the Russian national team and the two have since had close contact.
The short amount of time he has with the players makes one doubt how large an impact he will have on the team. “It’s never enough time to prepare a team in one week but this is an exceptional situation. Chelsea have good players and they should be in top form and that should make my job easier.” Chelsea are currently 4 in the table 7 points below Manchester United.

Hiddink is currently on contract as a temporary manager until the end of the season; however, when asked if he would stay he said: “There are two scenarios: it goes bad and they say ‘go back east’ or it goes well, but I’m not thinking that far ahead. There will be no damage for the Russian national team, we focus now and in the future on the Russian team.”
Hiddink has said he will contact Scolari about team matters and that he currently was not intending on bringing in and new assistants. “I always want to see the situation in the team myself first before making any changes if they have to be made.”

While I believe that Hiddink is an excellent manager with extensive international club and national team experience (he has won multiple awards with PSV Eindhoven, led S. Korea to 4th place in 2002 World Cup, the Netherlands to 4th place in the 1998 World Cup, les Australia to 2nd round of World Cup, led Russia to the semi-finals of the Euro 2008, managed Fenerbache, Valencia, Real Madrid and Real Betis) I think it is safe to question this move by Chelsea. Firing Scolari this early could disrupt the team; now Chelsea will have a temporary manager before Hiddink arrives and then will have to sync with a completely new manager. Hopefully the Russian national team won’t be too much of a distraction for Hiddink, luckily for him they only have 2 games over the course of the rest of the EPL season.