You’re not sure why, but somehow you imagined that these two would have sat down for a chat at least once before. After all, they live within a long goal kick of each other, minutes from Stamford Bridge, where one played and managed for five years and where the other still plies his trade (they missed each other at Chelsea by nine months).

And yet, this is the first time that Frank Lampard and Gianluca Vialli have had the opportunity freely to chew the fat for a couple of hours. You knew there was plenty of common ground: Chelsea, being fathers to two little girls and a love of London tempered by the curiosity of life abroad. What perhaps you did not imagine is just how open these two would be. And you wonder why players can’t be like this all the time.

“It’s a defence mechanism,” Vialli says. “It would be great to be able to speak your mind, to be frank and honest and say exactly what you think. But then you also have to be aware that what you say can be used against you. And sometimes they’ll take one single sentence out of context and change the whole meaning of a long conversation.”

“It would be great if it was just all about what you do on the pitch, but it is not,” Lampard adds. “So if you say something that can be used against you and make you look bad, it becomes a story and it can grow into a monster. We’re not just judged as players, we’re judged as people. And so we have to be careful.”

But then there are also lose-lose propositions. Questions to which you know it’s best not to answer.

“It’s a question of respect,” Vialli says. “If you ask me ‘is Gerrard better than Lampard?’, I have my own opinion, but I don’t want that opinion to be out in the newspapers. And so you don’t answer.”

The stock answer, that by being celebrity footballers their opinions are necessarily part of the public domain and the public “is entitled to know” seems rather flimsy when put like that. Why does the public want to know? And does the public want to know the full answer – which is, most likely, going to be filled with caveats and hypotheticals – or the distilled, “he’s good, he’s crap” soundbite? All too often, it’s the latter.

It’s a bit like the question of what Lampard’s future will hold. With his contract winding down, inevitably there has been plenty of speculation. It’s human nature to demand a simple, immediate answer. Clearly, however, there cannot be such a thing. Vialli was 32 in 1996 when, having just captained Juventus to Champions League glory, he chose to move to England. Lampard turns 30 this summer.

Whatever decision the England midfield player makes, he knows the clock is ticking. Retirement, whether in four, six or eight years, is over the horizon. Then things will never be the same.

“I had a very intense career as a player and an equally intense one as a manager,” Vialli says. “It was brief, but I was very young and it took a lot out of me. I was successful at times and unsuccessful at times. I was sacked twice. And then my priorities changed a little bit. After 25 years in football, now what matters most is I want to make sure I am happy and my family is happy. I don’t have to be a football manager. I can be perfectly happy without being involved in football. Of course, if an opportunity arises I may give it another go. But when I see managers on television and they are pasty, pale, stressed out, I’m happy I’m a family man now. I was a workaholic for 25 years, I’m enjoying my break.”

“What you say is exactly how I feel,” Lampard chimes in. “I don’t want to be a football manager. I love football, it’s my life. I’ll always watch it and I’ll come and support Chelsea, but it doesn’t interest me in that way. I want to travel, to be with my family, to live a more relaxed life.”

“The problem you’ll face, though, is that you’ll miss the butterflies you get every weekend,” Vialli says. “You’ll need to find a substitute for that. I get some of it from working in television and being a pundit.”

“I will miss it, of course,” Lampard adds. “I think I have a lot to give. It’s just that it’s the kind of thing that if you do it, you have to do it intensely, like [José] Mourinho did.”

One may not miss management and the other may have no interest in becoming a manager, but the conversation quickly turns to the biggest job in English management (and the best-paid in the world). Can Fabio Capello bring England some silverware?

“He has experience, confidence and belief, but managing a country is very different from managing a club,” Vialli says. “One of his greatest strengths is identifying players he wants and getting his chairman to deliver them. Well, obviously, he can’t go to the chairman of the FA and say, ‘Buy me this centre forward’. So you need to go with what you have at your disposal. And I think England have a lot of potential. But still, it’s a different proposition. And he’s always had the opportunity to work with players day in, day out, whereas now he’ll only get them for a few days once every few months. That’s complicated when you’re trying to teach something new.”

Vialli turns to Lampard. “For example, it seems to me that he wants England to pass the ball around and be patient and do something different. “But, correct me if I’m wrong, didn’t you guys do it with previous managers? And can you do it more effectively with a couple of training sessions every few months?”

“We did try that route, and maybe that’s where we went wrong,” Lampard says. “We’re a team that can obviously beat anyone and, as we’ve shown, lose to anyone. But in modern football, you have to be organised and tactically aware.

It’s not necessarily about playing beautiful, open football. Look at Greece at Euro 2004. Or Italy at the World Cup, except for the semi-final. If you play open, gung-ho football, you might tear your opponent apart or you might dominate them and still get beat. It’s something you have to learn to do correctly. When I first arrived at Chelsea, we were losing to teams like Viking Stavanger in the Uefa Cup. We’d go out all gung-ho, we’d concede an away goal and then it was game over. We’ve moved on from that point, thanks to [Claudio] Ranieri and Mourinho. England has to learn to do the same.”

Vialli, of course, moved abroad. Lampard may or may not do so. What they agree upon is that, overall, it can be tremendously beneficial.

“I always advise Italian players to move to the Premier League and I would advise anyone to try playing abroad,” Vialli says. “It’s a new challenge, it opens your mind and you can definitely learn a lot. In my case, English football certainly brought out the best of me. I think going abroad, to Italy or Spain, might do the same for an English player.”

“In the modern game it would definitely help us,” Lampard says. “Imagine if our national team had, say, four or five of the team who had travelled, who had learned a bit more of the Italian game or the Spanish game or whatever. We’re all in our comfort zone here in the Premier League. Especially now that the money is the same or better as it is abroad, many think, ‘Why take a chance?’

“In England we’re very one-track. I was the same before I came to Chelsea. I would never leave Essex. I mean, going to Harrods was a big day out for me. And many of us had that mentality. But if you went abroad and you dealt with a different language, different food, different culture . . . you’d be a better person for sure to deal with all that. And let’s face it, we English haven’t been very good at it.”

Vialli took the step abroad; Lampard may or may not, but the mere fact that he sees the benefits shows that something’s changed in English football. And, most likely, for the better.

Listen to Gianluca Vialli and Frank Lampard on TheGame Podcast, available to download from 6pm on Monday.