Jose Mourinho says Chelsea were right to let Frank Lampard leave Stamford Bridge last summer.
Lampard has emerged as a key figure in Manchester City's title challenge, with his goal in Saturday's 1-0 win against Leicester allowing the defending Premier League champions to stay just three points behind leaders Chelsea.

'Lampard one of England's greats'

• Frank Lampard is one of the best English footballers ever to play the game, according to his Manchester City team-mate Bacary Sagna.
• Lampard has already scored six goals in 13 appearances for City, having ended his 13-year Chelsea career in the summer, with his winner against Leicester his 175th Premier League strike.
• "He is a great guy and he has fitted in perfectly," said Sagna. "He showed here that he can score important goals and he is a great player.
• "He was always very good. He has shown many times that he is a great player. As long as we have him on board, it's always good.
• "His goal record doesn't surprise me because he is a great professional. He keeps working really hard in training.
• "He always tries his best and he is always ready to come in, even if it's for 10 minutes. He is one of the best English players I have ever seen."

He also scored the equaliser when the top two played against each other at the Etihad Stadium in September, but Mourinho feels the moment was right to bring the curtain down on Lampard's 13-year Chelsea career, in order to move the club forward.
"He left Chelsea as a free agent and chooses his life, we can't complain about it, that's football," Mourinho said. "It's his life, nothing to do with us. We made the right decision.
"My view is that when you want to look forward, look to the future and have people like [Cesc] Fabregas and [Nemanja] Matic and Jeremie Boga (a midfielder with the under-21s) which are the next 10 years of the club.
"The project is to prepare for the next 10 years, not for the next year. We made the right decision.
"You can argue 'You have John Terry and Didier Drogba'. Different. Drogba is a striker that is coming to help and support the team. John Terry is the best central defender in English football and it doesn't matter how old he is.
"The nucleus of the team has to be developed and to have a big player like Frank we would stop the development of the other guys."

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