The captain, leader, and legend has spoken ladies and gents, and it comes as no surprise to hear him saying basically what we have all been saying, what the likes of John Obi Mikel, Frank Leboeuf, Frank Lampard, Jody Morris, Joe Cole have been saying, what top pundits and journos have been saying, and loads more have been saying.
In a nutshell, Chelsea’s struggles and lack of success so far is due to an immature team that lacks leaders.
This is Chelsea’s current ‘leadership group’ according to The Athletic…
Reece James
Enzo Fernandez
Moises Caicedo
Levi Colwill
“Uncle” Tosin
Marcus Bettinelli
OK, so we have an injury prone captain, who does appear to be growing with his vocal leadership skills but has a long way to go, Fernandez, who is really standing up now as a leader granted, Caicedo, who is more a leader by example than anything else, Colwill, who hand ‘yapped’ at his own fans last week and is not yet mature enough, Tosin, who is a decent squad player but no more than that and I also don’t even see him that vocal on the pitch, and a goalkeeper who never plays so cannot be a vital leader where it is needed, ON the pitch! Might as well put him with the new Rugby chap, as neither can effect leadership where it’s most important, in-game.
Just compare this to Chelsea’s leadership groups of the past. I know we should stop looking back and seeking nostalgia, and football has changed, blah blah blah. But there is absolutely no reason why we cannot recruit to build a better leadership group and no reason that this has been ignored. There is no reason why we should not have added balance to our squad build. It’s literally so simple to address, and we all know we need it.
John Terry points to the age of the squad as a reason for Chelsea’s struggles:
“We’ve shown signs of being a really young squad this season, I say that in terms of the performances where you see a really good spell and then we’ve come off it.”
He also said this on the the UCL, which is the exact mentality that needs to seep through the club but has lacked.
“Listen, Champions League has to be the minimum every year for me.”
And this is right, standards should never slip no matter what. I don’t care that we are in a project, this mentality needs to stay and this is why Todd Boehly initially saw the value of experience as well as youth.
A youth-led policy is great if it is done right and has added balance with it.
Chelsea have apparently just dropped another £12.5m on a 17-year-old left back who will join in 2026.
If you are continuing to make signings like this, fine, great, but if you are doing this and still ignoring the here and now, that becomes unacceptable. If we hear that finds aren’t available or PSR restricts us from buying elite players where they are needed this summer, then fully expect fans to be angry once again.
I maintain, if Chelsea recruited with added balance and signed key leaders in the spine with physicality and strong mentalities and experience, then we would be playing Champions League football THIS season.
But don’t listen to me repeating myself every week, listen to the actual experts I mentioned above, because these guys know how to win, know how to succeed, and know how to be in a consistent and successful team and know what that takes.
