John Terry could be on his way out of Chelsea but still knows how to play the crowd

Watford 0 Chelsea 0

(Getty Images)

The perfect defender’s result after the weekend’s news, the ideal response from John Terry’s fans – but also the perfect case study as to why a new contract for the 35-year-old is still up in the air.

The Chelsea captain was key to his side pointedly keeping a clean sheet at Watford just days after he so strategically revealed that he was unlikely to get a new deal. But a bit of luck kept it at 0-0 too – especially in the first half.

Throughout this game, Terry showed signs of why he should still be kept around, but also indications as to how he will continue to decline as a player at his age.

He still showed his old resilience, though, which is one big reason why there was no indecision among the Chelsea fans: they want him to stay.

One curiosity of the situation is that all this comes at a time when his importance to the side has only been reasserted. After a patchy start to the season by Terry, and a period when Jose Mourinho rotated his centre-halves, Guus Hiddink has made his preference clear: Terry and Kurt Zouma have started every single league game since the Dutch coach’s second spell in charge began.

It also says much that Terry’s comments completely overshadowed those of unsettled Gary Cahill on Sunday, who has much more of a legitimate current grievance, given that he is not getting any minutes ahead of Euro 2016. Terry’s words have also rendered Radamel Falcao a near afterthought, as the Colombian was embarrassingly left out of Chelsea’s Champions League squad.

All of that obviously reflects Terry’s historic status – but also how he has recovered his sturdiness, and seems so important in helping to develop Zouma. He was again constantly talking the 21-year-old through this game. The two do seem to complement each other perfectly as centre-halves, in terms of profile and approach. Here, they tried to use that to their advantage even more than usual by shuffling the pacy Odion Ighalo on to the other depending on the situation, and eventually stifled him altogether.

Despite that, Terry evidently felt he had to complement that key role with a bit of fan support. That, of course, was what Sunday’s comments were really about. Hiddink admitted that Terry could yet be offered a new deal and, despite the player’s camp insisting they feel the case is closed and he will have to move, his comments seemed wholly intended to open it up again by appealing to fans – and putting pressure on the club.

Long before this match even started, the away crowd were chanting only Terry’s name. By the time it came to the team announcement, they were ready to cheer his name louder than anyone else. It continued throughout, with many renditions of “John Terry – he’s one of our own”.

In that regard, Terry has also made the situation his own too. He has taken control of it as best he can, even if it is rather politically transparent.

Something else remains rather transparent, too: Terry is not going to get any better.

He may have creditably recovered some form after a poor start to the season, which is impressive at 35, but this game also emphasised there are creeping elements to his game that are going to be rendered unfixable by age

At one point in the first half, he was left on his knees by the movement of Ighalo, who did seem to target Terry more than Zouma. That type of fall is something that has been conspicuous in Terry’s career because it has been so rare – but not as rare as him being beaten in the air.

The captain was lucky that his keeper Thibaut Courtois caught Sebastian Prodl’s strong 26th-minute header from a corner, after the Watford centre-half had left Terry standing. That going in could have put a very different spin on the night.

As has become all too typical with Terry, though, it’s not like any of this affects his mentality. By the end of the first half, he was regularly beating Ighalo to the ball, cleverly using his anticipation to quieten the striker’s movement. He was back in command, but still with the lingering sense that he requires an entire team system to suit his specific physical attributes for that to be the case.

That was what happened and, in the second half, Terry was composed and showed his passing remains underrated. He had responded.

The wonder is how Chelsea will respond to everything else that has happened – not least in the stands. This was an indication of how the next few months will go – especially if Terry is not given another year