OK, so next Friday’s game against Brighton is MUCH more important than Saturday’s game in the FA Cup, for sure.
Getting in the Champions League at the end of this season is MUCH more important than moving along in the FA Cup.
However, to go out of the competition in the fourth round is very disappointing. On the upside it means less games and we can hopefully try and keep on top of fatigue and injuries a bit better. But an FA Cup run can do wonders for confidence and momentum and also, losing against Brighton a week before playing them in the league could have a negative effect in the build up. It could also have a positive effect by the way, but with an immature and young team that lacks leaders and motivators, I’d suspect the effect will be negative than positive.
Chelsea got dumped out of the cup by their feeder club Brighton [Brighton feed us] last night and in fact, the seagulls played against Chelsea like they were feeding their young.
The Blues lined up with THREE former Brighton players and of course, a board room and staff that includes a number of former Brighton employees too.
The game itself though was bland. I think Brighton, even though they were the home side, were a little nervous after getting smashed 7-0 by Nottingham Forest last weekend. But they needn’t have worried against a Chelsea side that once again lacked urgency, intensity, and any ideas at all in the attacking third. Chelsea were predictable again and just had nothing at all in terms of any penetrating or direct play and just looked lethargic yet again.
In fact, The Blues managed just ONE single shot on target all game and a measly 7 attempts on goal. Brighton didn’t do much better with just six attempts on goal, yet with 3 on target.
The Blues edged possession with 58%, but most of that was very much just keeping the ball in deep areas and doing absolutely nothing with it. This has become a bit of a theme under Enzo Maresca, and more and more fans are growing frustrated with it, not just match-goers.
Maresca should never be immune to criticism and questioning, and to be honest, the more he speaks, the more frustrating he is becoming to me as well. I want to see more accountability and transparency now, it’s gotten to the point where it’s gone beyond protecting all of your players. Tell them some home truths. If they can’t stand the heat then they can get the hell out of the kitchen. This is Chelsea FC, we don’t molly coddle.
Maresca was always a risk, I said that from day one. I was VERY surprised to see Chelsea make the hire. But he started well, I don’t think that should be forgotten already. I think he was actually working miracles at one point because as you know, I don’t think this squad build is anywhere near good enough – so Maresca for me, was over-achieving up until Christmas.
But unfortunately he has been a little more found out since then, and that is because purely he has one way of setting up and when that is not working, or when teams know how to counter it, Maresca has nothing else, he does not have a plan b or any way to tweak tactics and trump opponents.
But turning on the manager is not something I will be doing, as I said a few weeks back. Asking for yet another manager to be sacked under this ownership is playing into their hands – they would want any blame to be deflected from them when the reality is, THEY are the ones who hired Maresca, and THEY are the ones who continue to hire managers they then say are failing, thus THEY made the mistake of hiring them in the first place, right?
Don’t get me wrong, I have concerns over Maresca, I really do. But he is not the problem at our football club – the problem is Behdad Eghbali, Laurence Stewart, and Paul Winstanley. They are the ones who had the ridiculously stupid idea of building a squad full of kids, with no experience, no leaders, no backbone, a lack of physicality, and still without a real solid spine and core – doing all of this whilst spending £1.5bn! Maresca didn’t build the squad, unfortunately he is just a yes man and a bit of a puppet I am afraid to say – he is diplomatic and just says what they need him to say.
You cannot keep sacking or blaming managers without addressing the route of the problem. If the decision makers at the club continue with this youth ideology that may or may not come good in years to come, then the only blame for things not going well is on them.
Why would you not give Maresca the very best chance of succeeding? Remember, he asked for a centre back, midfield cover, and a striker in the last window. I don’t care what he says in public, but there is no way anyone can tell me with a straight face that he was happy with not getting a striker, getting an 19-year-old midfielder with 8 senior league apps to his name as midfield cover, and recalling a centre back that the sporting directors did all they physically could to freeze out after briefing the media that he did not suit Maresca’s football just six months prior. NO WAY. Not hearing your briefings, not hearing your diplomacy, not hearing anything you try push out in the media. Once again, fans are NOT stupid.
Christopher Nkunku was forced to start up front yesterday because the sporting directors are incompetent and have failed to sign an out and out number 9 for the past FIVE transfer windows and now we have injuries. Imagine that? Players getting injured and now we are stuck? We needed a damn striker BEFORE these injuries by the way, they just elevated it more. So Nkunku, a 10, was forced to play as a 9 again and guess what? He was terrible. I’d genuinely rather start a natural 9 from the academy up front that Nkunku, because every time he plays there, he is awful.
Nkunku failed to register a single attempt on goal and was unsuccessful with his one attempt at a dribble. He was also dispossessed on multiple occasions and registered just 34 touches on the ball, a number that was even less than Chelsea’s goalkeeper, Robert Sanchez (54). That is so bad. If we had signed a new striker in January, which every Chelsea fan knew should have been the priority yet the ‘experts’ did not and spent all window ‘preparing’ deals for Alejandro Garnacho and Jamie Gittens for the summer (per media briefings), then we would not have lost that game yesterday, that I am very confident in saying. Why are we undervaluing a focal point up top SO much?
Trevoh Chalobah is decent, but there is a reason that I wasn’t overly disappointed to see that he was going in the summer. I thought the treatment of him was terrible, and although he is always going to be a pretty reliable defender and overall decent, he was never going to elevate what we have. Our centre backs have more question marks over them and lack any one centre back who has the x-factor and who is a dominant front foot centre back. Again, this is something all of us fans saw. Our defence really concerns me still and has done all season.
Our attack also concerns me. I liked the signings of Jadon Sancho and Pedro Neto because both have Premier League experience and on their day can offer a lot. But did/do either have that elevating x-factor that I always talk about? I’m not so sure. But hey, at least they weren’t teenagers with a handful of senior appearances again.
What IS Maresca’s football by the way? I’m sat here sipping my morning coffee still having no idea what that is. We often have more possession that our opponents, granted, but we don’t often look overly threatening with it. As I say, Maresca should never be immune to criticism.
But the problems start at the top and everyone’s frustrations should always start there. Yes, you can be frustrated with Maresca, some of his decisions, and puzzled with what his football actually is. But let’s also remember that many times this season we have seen pockets of good football played by his Chelsea team and he almost got us top of the league right before Christmas. That was an achievement alone. But consistency is key, and I maintain, we have also got very lucky with how other top sides have dropped around us and basically handed us all these chances as well. Maresca has shown some signs of becoming the manager we all want at Chelsea, but right now there are also just a bunch of big question marks over his head too.
I will end this by saying that if Chelsea want to go forward fast, rather than wait another couple of seasons for our young players to then peak and become the age and players that we should have signed initially and would have seen quicker and better results with if we simply added balance to the recruitment of kids, then either the sporting directors and Eghbali need to show a shift in their recruitment and add some proven/experienced/leadership to the spine of this team as soon as possible, or all three of them go and let new people come in and lead. It’s that simple. I love how that if you want to see a balanced squad build you are somehow seen as a ‘purest’ when the reality is, you are just being sensible and logical by wanting to see that.
Please don’t get too caught up in another manager being blamed and focus on what the real issues are. I’m not some sort of Maresca-stan either, I’ve literally criticised him a bunch in this article alone. But I just don’t want us to lose our focus here and what the route issues are at our beloved club that I have never felt so far away from.
For the first time, I’ve seen genuine Chelsea fans who I actually like, starting to talk about protests at games aimed at the owners/SDs, and I completely understand why they are thinking this now. It might be time to take action.
