“Didier was the first: Chelsea are like a big family and we sat and ate in the canteen with the players, so we started an organic conversation while we ate,” says Menon.
“He asked me what I could do for him and I told him we could try it, and he asked me to try it right away. That was the moment football opened up in front of me.
“Then Joe Cole, Frank Lampard and John Terry started coming to me to try it.
“The medical department was fantastic and made me part of their team, despite being from a different discipline.”
Menon’s classes consisted of meditation, honing players’ mental skills, and dispelling harmful concepts that could involve high-level power and scrutiny.
“I was an untitled person, teaching players self-care and how to balance them spiritually and emotionally and ultimately impact them physically,” Menon says.
“They are human beings and they need a friend to laugh with, babble with and then they will open up.
“In sport and in industry you want to feel free of the mind. It’s the same: the mind is everything.”
Menon was a constant presence in Chelsea’s backroom for 13 years, working under managers such as Carlo Ancelotti, Rafael Benitez, José Mourinho, Antonio Conte and, finally, Thomas Tuchel.
“They offered me the chance to be part of all the trophies Chelsea received in 2010,” he says.
“What a delight, it was a fantastic range, frankly I skip a lot.”
