Former Chelsea midfielder on Nicolas Jackson’s future after “stupid, stupid” moment | OneFootball

It’s been a tough time for Nicolas Jackson this season. A long spell without scoring combined with an injury has undone a lot of good work from earlier in the campaign, and a silly red card in a crucial game against Newcastle compounded frustrations.

On Jon Obi Mikel’s podcast this week he spoke about the situation and compared it to what he’d seen on the pitch in his own time at Chelsea.

Mikel on Jackson’s “stupid” mistake

Nicolas Jackson with a Chelsea News logo. (Photo by George Wood/Getty Images)

“It was a stupid, stupid mistake. There’s no doubt about that. Because he looked at the man, he looked at the ball, he knew exactly what he was doing. Bang,” the former Blues midfielder said.

“He has to learn from this situation. When we go into big games, there’s emotions. You want to go out there and show and compete, you want to let your opponent know ‘yes, I’m here, you need to feel me, you need to feel my presence.’ That happens. I’ve been in big games where – Didier Drogba was sent off the Champions League final 2008. That was emotion, that was adrenaline. I’ve been in a semi final where John Terry was sent off. Big game, semi final, Nou Camp. Got sent off. That was emotion. So these things happen, BUT, you have to learn from it. We have to move on from it, he has to learn from it, to make sure that this doesn’t happen, in the crucial time of the season where his teammates need him, the club needs him, the fans need him, and he’s sort of let everybody down.”

You can see Mikel speaking in the clip embedded here:

Jackson deserves a second chance – just like Chelsea heroes

It’s certainly true that we need to remember those incidents, coming from legendary players. We remember being so furious at Drogba, and in total disbelief when Terry went. Those were born winners, with tons of experience, and they made these colossal mistakes.

Jackson is much younger and more raw and we won’t hold this against him if he learns from it.