Petr Cech knows where the questions are leading. He knows Thibaut Courtois is the elephant in the room.
Courtois is actually in Spain, on loan at Atletico Madrid, where he’s been for three years, but Jose Mourinho says he will return to London and this has clear implications for Cech, Chelsea’s undisputed No 1 goalkeeper for a decade.
Cech’s standards are more exacting than ever. He has set a club record for clean sheets this season, passed 100 Champions League appearances and his penalty-saving heroics from the 2012 final are being cast in stone by adidas.
No 1: Goalkeeper Petr Cech poses as part of Chelsea's adidas kit launch
Horror show: David Luiz (left) is blasted by Cech after scoring an own goal against Paris Saint-Germain
Usurper? Thibaut Courtois (left) is likely to return to Stamford Bridge after a loan spell at Atletico Madrid
He has conceded just a single goal at Stamford Bridge in 2014. His form is good and yet only one goalkeeper can play. Cech is a legend at 31 and an intelligent and authoritative dressing-room voice.
Courtois is 10 years his junior, in equally impressive form and could be Chelsea’s goalkeeper for the next 15 years. Before he tackles this, Cech confronts what he sees as a couple of common misconceptions.
First, that the notion of competition will be new to him. ‘I had Carlo Cudicini behind me when I came here, the best goalkeeper in the Premier League at the time,’ said Cech. ‘When Ross Turnbull played for Middlesbrough he was a big English prospect and he really improved here.
‘Hilario has always been ready to play, and you can see the difference at Fulham when Mark Schwarzer is not there. He has been absolutely brilliant for Middlesbrough and Fulham and I’m still playing. This has been really underestimated.’
'If Courtois comes back and he’s better than me, credit to him, well done to him, but who knows? I’m not afraid'
‘This amazes me,’ said Cech. ‘It absolutely makes me laugh. People say I’m the old- fashioned goalkeeper who doesn’t really like to sweep. If you look how high I play on the field, regarding any goalkeeper I can remember, nobody plays higher than I’m playing.
Look familiar? Cech recreates his Champions League penalty-saving antics for an adidas campaign
Access denied: Cech is the picture of focus as he bats Bastian Schweinsteiger's penalty away
Just reward: Cech lifts the Champions League trophy after an historic victory at the Allianz Arena in Munich
The return of Mourinho has restored Chelsea’s reputation as a mean defensive machine. ‘We set up to give ourselves the chance to control and win the game,’ said Cech. ‘If you go out and say we’ll defend and hope — fingers crossed — we don’t concede, it never works. You see teams try to do that and they never win.’
Before settling down to chat, he has been doing a training drill, collecting crosses in a goalmouth cluttered with training dummies. As the ball sails into his airspace, someone lifts a cone and its colour corresponds to an area on the pitch where Cech has to despatch the ball as soon as he has caught it.
‘The only time you have to see the colour is when the ball is in the air and then it disappears,’ said Cech. ‘If you miss it, you don’t know where to throw and it’s a problem. You need to observe and concentrate and see where you’re going. And you need to catch the ball, which is the main part. Your brain is constantly working.’
Cech conceded three goals in a Champions League quarter-final in Paris on Wednesday and had to shoulder at least some of the blame for one of the goals. He challenges himself daily. He thinks about his game, seeking new ways to improve.
Fresh faced: Cech (left) holds his 2005 Premier League Goalkeeper of the Year award with Jose Mourinho (right) and Frank Lampard
Growing up in Spain: Courtois (pictured at Atletico in 2011, left) has spent three years in Madrid on loan
'I am not playing because my name is Petr Cech. I’m playing because I’ve been playing well and because the manager thinks it improves the team with me in goal.'
‘If you are a goalkeeper who started playing at eight years old, saving a routine shot doesn’t make you improve,’ said Cech.
‘You can shoot 50 shots and it is easy. Your brain reacts always the same way, but if you distract the brain, you have to make sure you’re doing everything in the right order.
‘The tennis ball is a completely different size, with a completely different flight, and you can’t just grab it the same way. It puts demands on coordination. The capacity of the brain is endless but you need to find different ways to improve it.’
And so to Courtois, the young Belgian who wants assurances that he will start the season at Chelsea on an equal footing with Cech before he agrees to extend a contract which is set to expire in 2016.
Exacting standards: Cech and goalkeeping coach Christophe Lollichon often train with tennis balls
Consolation: Cech and team-mate John Terry talk after the Chelsea captain nodded an own goal home
Calamity: Terry headed the ball out of Cech's hands and into the back of the net against Crystal Palace
‘If, on the first day of pre-season, Thibaut Courtois is here, he is here,’ said Cech. ‘If he is not, he is not. It does not change anything. I will still have to do better than whoever else is here, to keep my place. It doesn’t change anything for me. You could ask John Terry or Gary Cahill about the very promising French central defender bought by the club.
‘If he comes back and he’s better than me, credit to him, well done to him, but who knows? I’m not afraid. I’m not a fool to think I’ve been here 10 years and I’ll be here another five, just because.
‘I am not playing because my name is Petr Cech. I’m playing because I’ve been playing well and because the manager thinks it improves the team with me in goal. I’ve never had a manager who would just put me in the goal because everybody was used to seeing me there.
Top talent: Courtois has helped Atletico to the top of La Liga and has given them the chance to lift the title
Seeing double: Courtois (left) and Atletico won the Europa League two years ago, the season before Cech and Chelsea lifted the trophy in 2013 (right)
Blueprint for success: adidas mocked up a graphic of the mechanics of Cech's penalty save
Dynamic duo: Cech and Terry high-five after Arsenal striker Olivier Giroud spurns a chance
Powerless: Cech watches as Stevan Jovetic of Manchester City rolls the ball beyong the Czech goalkeeper
‘Are you good? Are you not? I’m not crazy to think in another 10 years I will just be playing. There will come a day when somebody comes along who is better than me. That’s it. But my everyday fight is to avoid that as long as I can. This is football life. Let’s see.’
Cech also has a contract until 2016. ‘I will see what happens in two years,’ he said. ‘The moment I feel I’m not good enough to compete at the highest level I will stop, no matter if that’s in one year or 10. I’m not giving myself any deadlines. I would like to continue.’
Thibaut Courtois has been warned. Cech is not going to step aside and make it easy.
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