CHELSEA MANAGER ROBERTO Di Matteo has refused to rule out defender John Terry being stripped of the club’s captaincy.

Terry was recently banned for four matches and fined 220,000 pounds by the FA after he was found guilty of racially abusing QPR defender Anton Ferdinand.

Chelsea have opened confidential disciplinary actions against Terry after he chose not to appeal the FA’s punishment.

Di Matteo remained tight-lipped about the action the club would take against their captain.

“We do not publicly discuss the disciplinary matters that we take against our players so you will have to wait and see,” Di Matteo told reporters on Friday.

“We appreciate that he (John Terry) had not appealed the ban and fine and also that he has apologised publicly for the language that he used and I think we are supportive of that.

“We are taking action against our player and we feel it’s an appropriate action taken against him as we do with supporters (who use racially abusive language) so we don’t feel we are operating differently from that point of view.”

The Chelsea manager preferred to switch attention to his side’s match against Tottenham on Saturday.

The reigning Champions League winners travel to north London for the match at White Hart Lane knowing they have not won at Spurs in seven years.

“I think we are more focused on playing against Tottenham, a team that is in very good form, with four consecutive wins,” he said.

“We haven’t won in the league there since 2005 which is a very long time. There have been some very good games, some difficult games for us to play as well.”

Chelsea lead the English Premier League table with 19 points from seven matches, which sees them more than a game clear of Manchester United and Manchester City.

As it happened: Drogheda United v Sligo Rovers, Airtricity League>

Delaney and Trap hold talks in Dublin>