Marcel Desailly has again rounded on his Chelsea team-mates and claimed that they were stronger under Gianluca Vialli than they are under the current manager Claudio Ranieri.

The France captain fears that Chelsea are a soft touch because they can no longer handle the pressure of the Premiership as they once did.

"The team under Vialli were more ready to cope when they were in trouble, to analyse the game and come through it," said Desailly. "Now, although we have more quality, we are a bit crazy. We are not able to analyse the moment. We are not able to slow down and keep what we have in our pockets."

Desailly, the club captain, angered his team-mates last month with his admission to the French media that he has not always tried his hardest for Chelsea so that he could save his best performances for his country.

Despite that admission, he criticised his fellow players at Stamford Bridge for their inconsistency.

"We have had great moments - like going on nine-game runs. And yes, we have done well - but we still do not have the overall consistency," said the 33-year-old centreback.

"We are not ready yet, we are only sometimes like a good team but we do not have enough about ourselves - individually or collectively - to get out of trouble.

"This is the main thing because, if we had that, we could be one of the best teams in the league.

Desailly said he thought other teams now know how to break Chelsea down.

"Maybe some of the lower opposition know from our history that if they are ready to play hard against us they can beat us," he said. "The bigger teams wait for us to come at them and match us."

Surprisingly, Desailly's comments were broadcast on Chelsea TV, the club's own subscription channel, which normally only offers a sanitised version of life at the club. The club were this morning unavailable for comment.