Christine Lampard has admitted her husband, Frank, takes his job very seriously as his Coventry City team returns to the Premiership. The former England star, 48, led the Sky Blues to the Championship title in May to seal promotion to the top flight after a 25-year absence and signed a new contract with the club until 2029.
Frank's Chelsea struggles revealed
Loose Women star Christine, 47, who shares two children with Frank, whom she married in 2015, usually keeps her relationship secrets out of the spotlight. However, she has opened up about the private issues her husband has faced during his long career, which hasn't always been swathed in success.
Frank spent 20 years in England's top flight, making his debut as a teenager at West Ham United in 1995. It was his 13 years at Stamford Bridge that cemented his legacy in the Premier League as he became one of the division's most prolific scorers from midfield.
Pressure of managing Chelsea
In 2019, Frank became Chelsea's boss, with the Blues briefly topping the table in the dad-of-four's second season at the club after a 3-1 win over Leeds United in December. They also topped their group in the Champions League. However, the tide began to turn during the festive period. Chelsea went on a run of just two wins in eight under Frank, which saw them drop to ninth in the table.
Under increasing pressure, the former footballer was eventually sacked on January 25, 2021, with the club stating that "results and performances have not met the club's expectations, leaving the club mid-table without any clear path to sustained improvement."
Christine on Frank's struggles
Revealing the pressure her husband was under when playing for Chelsea, Christine told the Loose Women podcast: "I remember often when he was playing, and the pressures of, you know, doing a job where there's millions of people watching you… I think it was even pre-he and I getting together, and there were a couple of moments obviously where it didn't go according to plan, when you're playing for your country and you've got the entire country pointing at you afterwards."
Insisting that Frank tried his best to be "strong" while later managing Chelsea, she continued: "Because Frank had been through the football thing and the need for feeling like you've got a team, a tribe, a group of people around you that will support you when you're you're kind of having moments of feeling, 'Oh, I should be strong, but I'm just not feeling it today. But how do I really tell everybody because they'll never understand?' So yeah, that was something I would always have been very aware of with him."
Christine then admitted that Frank would take personal or team losses to heart, which she said impacted his social life and mood even when off the pitch. Revealing he would cancel nights out when Chelsea lost out of 'anger', she shared: "He used to cancel nights out when Chelsea didn't win, when he was playing with them. We would maybe have plans to go for dinner or drinks or something and he'd go 'I'm not going. I just don't want to go. I don't want to go,' and there'd be anger and he just doesn't want to talk to anybody about it."
Christine added: "It was like he needed to kind-of decompress, and then he was ready to go again Monday morning. But there were loads of those moments where he thought, 'No, no, no,' and he'd be so angry with himself if something didn't go according to plan."
Coventry return and family life
Frank retired from playing in 2017, returning briefly to manage Chelsea in 2019. He signed as manager of Coventry City - which take on Hull today - in November 2024, and juggles this alongside TV jobs and raising his family. Christine and Frank parent his two daughters from a previous relationship with Spanish model Elen Rivas, and also welcomed a daughter, Patricia, in 2018 and a son, Frederick, three years later.
