Didier Drogba's season hasn't really caught fire. And the Ivorian seems to know why. The mindless way in which the striker dragged his studs down the ankle of Inter Milan's Brazilian midfielder Thiago Motta in the Champions League round-of-16 tie at Stamford Bridge last March suggested that Drogba, blinded with anger by Chelsea's imminent elimination from the competition, wasn't actually thinking at all. But even if the 32-year-old had, for one moment, considered the consequences of his actions, it's doubtful that he would have thought his behaviour on that spring night would still be affecting him the following autumn.

But it has. Wednesday night was Drogba's first Champions League start this season. He missed Chelsea's visit to Moscow two weeks back on account of a fever but he was ineligible for their opening two group games on account of the ban he received for that red card against Inter. As a result of that ineligibility, Drogba has found it difficult to find the same rhythm as his teammates, who have been able to play in all of Chelsea's fixtures.

"I won't say that I'm ever happy to miss games because I prefer to play and help my team," he says of that two-match ban. "I hope that missing a few games will help me later on in the season but it's not easy because when you're a player, at the start of the season especially, you want to keep playing, you want to repeat what you're doing on the pitch, you want to try to get things right, to define your condition and get the right understanding with your teammates. So, I've missed that a little bit and that's why I have found it a bit difficult in some league games. But from now on, I can play every game so that's a positive."

It is from Chelsea's point of view, but perhaps not the rest of the league. It is more than a little worrying for the likes of Manchester United and Arsenal that Carlo Ancelotti's side sit so authoritatively on top of the table without their main attacking threat displaying anything approaching his best form to date. Sure, Drogba has scored six league goals in advance of facing Liverpool this afternoon, putting him just a single strike behind Kevin Nolan, Carlos Tevez and teammate Florent Malouda in the scoring charts, but his overall contribution to Chelsea's cause hasn't been as whole as it was last season. Bar the games against Blackpool and Arsenal – a team who Drogba always seems to shine against – the striker hasn't bullied opponents with the robustious physicality that is his trademark. In fact, there has been something meek about much of his efforts this season. In the arm wrestle against Manchester City earlier this season, Drogba was substituted after 75 minutes without having laid a finger on an opponent. On Wednesday night at Stamford Bridge, he was even hustled off the ball by Aiden McGeady at one point. Perhaps the player's reticence is down, as he indicates, to the disruption of his early season.

Or perhaps there is another reason. It has been noticeable as Ancelotti's reign has progressed at Chelsea how frequently his front three – normally Malouda, Drogba and Nicolas Anelka – interchange positions. Rather than butting heads with a centre-half all the time, the striker is now spending a portion of most games out on the fringes, which may just have taken some of the ballast from his game. Still, he's not complaining. "I think with the frontline we have, we can rotate," he says. "We all understand each other. We don't spend a lot of time together off the pitch but when it comes to the pitch, we speak the same language [in both senses of the phrase]. That's very important. The good thing is that we are able to rotate and get the discipline right between us. The manager is happy with it."

As well Ancelotti might be. Drogba has the potential to be a difficult character but where, after the departure of Jose Mourinho from the club, the player seemed terminally unhappy with his lot for a couple of years, he seems to have been well and truly placated by the Italian's reign. So much so that he now indicates he would like to spend the rest of his career at the west London club. "You know, the spirit here is fantastic and the attitude of all the players is amazing," he says. "I would love to keep going for many years to come. I just love being on the pitch. I started late as a top footballer. I think I've been playing at a high level since I was 26, so I have more to come. And I hope to spend them here."

This afternoon, Drogba will start against Liverpool at Anfield in a match-up that Drogba describes as "special" and "interesting". Since Drogba joined Chelsea, the clubs have indeed enjoyed a string of closely-fought, if not exactly riveting, encounters in recent years, particularly in the Champions League. Overall, in his six seasons in English football, Drogba has faced the Reds on 22 separate occasions, scoring eight goals in the process. It's a particularly high number of times to have faced one team over the course of just six seasons, and indeed a low number of goals in so many games for a player who has averaged close to one in every two appearances for Chelsea since his arrival from Marseille. Which is probably why the player is going out of his way to insist he expects a difficult challenge this afternoon, despite Liverpool's early-season stutterings. "It won't be easy," says Drogba. "They've had a difficult start to the season but they've won their last two [league] games. They're going to be confident because of that. So we have to be wary."

FA Premier League: Liverpool v Chelsea, Anfield, 4.00, Live, Sky Sports 1, 3.30