FRANK LAMPARD Championship Manager of the season interview

How does it feel to be at the Champions League this season? Very happy. Hard work everywhere. You get that award individually but it takes everything. It takes myself, staff, players. It's been a special year for the football club in terms of what we've managed to achieve. That's the credit for all the work of everybody. Nice to see a few of your players there tonight as well getting recognition. Yes, really happy for those because they've delivered. I think there's some more, in my opinion, that would be in the equation for the team of the year. But that's what it is. There's a lot of quality players in the league that have delivered. I wouldn't take anything away from any of those either. For four of our boys to be in the team of the season is a big deal. They've been so consistent and so good that they deserve it. How tough has it been to keep the standards from last year as well, having to pick up the team and go again? Yes, hard but we've got a really good group. We didn't make so many changes. We've got a couple of players in that have given us impact. I think we carried on from where we were last year. The team improved a lot in the second half of the season. The players are so engaging. We got to the play-offs and we fouled. Sometimes that's just what football is. You just have to learn and stay resilient and all those things and we did that. And then, again, how the players have been from the early stages of the season to win games, back to back to back, to amass the points it takes to be in the automatic promotion story or question. They've done it. So all credits to the players. Really, really happy for everybody and a huge success for us. It's not a team of superstars. I think Thomas Asante was playing in League 2 a few years ago. Mason Clarke was in the National League. Does that make it extra special that these players have come through and will now get to experience the top flight? Well, it's been part of our strength as a group, the stories that you're saying, because there are quite a few of those, Efron, Brandon, for starters. We haven't got much Premier League experience of players that have been there. So the desire within the group is huge and that's probably shown in our performances over the year and their qualities, how they're trained, how they've worked and improved and that's them. Our job is to support and try and show them the way and the boys have done that. It's a nice story. It's good working with these players because they're desperate to get there. We'll have to go more. The gap is going to be a lot. The Premier League is the best league in the world but this league is the most challenging league in a way. So we'll try and adapt for that. How important is it now to finish the job and be champions? It's really important. I don't think we can get this far without finishing it as we want to. So we've got three games ahead of us. Very focused. Continue the way the boys have been all season and hopefully we'll do it. But I don't want to get to this point and not do that bit. It's an amazing feeling on Friday against Blackburn but we need to go again. What about the fans? How great have they been for you this season? They're incredible. We've got an amazing fan base but also the story that it's been this football club for 25 years to go down and back up. I know other clubs have done it but it's pretty unique and I think that's added extra fire to this situation in terms of the emotions that we saw on Friday night. So thank you to them because it wouldn't be the same football club without them whether it's at the CBS or travelling away like they were at Blackburn. There's some real important life stories in there where people have supported this club for many years and have gone to grounds and gone down and then come back up. That's a nice feeling in terms of what we've done as a group. The fans have been great.