The fact that Chelsea now have three of England’s likely back four ahead of Euro 2012 means that club and country should both be winners.

If Ashley Cole, John Terry and new No24 Gary Cahill are playing together week-in week-out, it promises a stable, settled international back line too, with no need for extra familiarisation training.

That’s assuming the central pairing works, and JT and the Blues’ new £80,000-a-week defender develop a good club understanding.

If they do, and the signs are promising, it will inevitably raise the issue of the longer term future of Brazilian David Luiz and the Serb Branislav Ivanovic at the club, with neither likely to relish the thought of merely being bench-warmers.

The first test comes this weekend when Chelsea travel to Norwich, a week and a bit before journeying to Swansea, where Arsenal came a cropper on Sunday.

As predicted in this column, young Chelsea midfielder Josh McEachran has been farmed out to Swansea until the end of the season, to get some regular match experience alongside former Blues team-mate Scott Sinclair.

The pair are in the curious situation of dating Coronation Street ‘sisters’. Were Wayne Rooney to start pursuing soap stars, poor Dot Cotton wouldn’t get a moment’s peace.

The first thing that Cahill, 26, will notice about Chelsea’s playing style is that he will get a lot more touches of the ball during a match than he has been used to at Bolton.

AVB, like several of his predecessors at the Bridge, likes to start his attacks slowly from the back, drawing opponents out of position before advancing into the midfield gaps.

The problem remains the finishing, but there were signs of Fernando Torres’ form returning during the 1-0 victory over Sunderland last weekend.

His acrobatic, aerobatic flying scissor kick deserved better than to rebound off the bar, although Frank Lampard was grateful for the assist.

Now all he needs to do is make the net bulge.