So much has been written recently about the demise of Chelsea. Fingers have been pointed at the manager, the players and even the medical staff. But what is the actual problem? And is it something that can be rectified before the axe is wielded upon player and manager alike?
Chelsea’s Premier League Problems
The only place to start is with the self-titled ‘Special One’. In his second spell at Chelsea, José Mourinho brought Premier League title success in his second season after narrowly missing out on the title in 2013-14 to Manchester City. Big money signings such as Cesc Fabregas and Diego Costa coincided with the rejuvenation of club captain John Terry who was largely hailed as the best centre-half in England last season. This came with the maturing of Belgian Eden Hazard who was instrumental in the title-winning campaign as he also picked up the player of the year award.
Chelsea were superb as they initially blew teams away before becoming a much more efficient animal. Come the turn of the year they won the majority of their games by a single goal and were far less prolific scoring wise. However, they were superb defensively only conceding 32 goals in 38 games to go with the second highest goals tally of the season with 73.
Fast forward half a year and the landscape is unrecognisable. Chelsea are 16th with 11 points from 12 games. They have conceded 23 goals and scored 16 in comparison to leaders Manchester City who have scored 26 and conceded nine. They have also lost seven games already, while in the entirety of last season they only lost three times in the Premier League. To compound matters, they currently sit 15 points adrift of City and Arsenal at the top and 13 points below Manchester United, who currently occupy the final Champions League place.
Mourinho has been unable to halt the demise of his team on the field while off the field he has been embroiled in a number of altercations. The Eva Carneiro saga continues to rumble on while the manager has had run-ins with the press on a number of occasions. He has not been afraid to make his feelings known to his players, too. Nemanja Matic’s substitution in the 3-1 defeat to Southampton — he was brought on as a second half substitute only to be taken off 27 minutes later — was a sign of his discontent.
Former Chelsea midfielder Frank Lampard expressed his concern and regarded Chelsea’s current form as “far from a blip, they are losing games regularly” after they slumped to a second defeat in as many weeks against Stoke.
Mourinho has enjoyed so much success at Porto, Inter Milan, Real Madrid and Chelsea that a slump in his form and success was surely inevitable. But even he could not have foreseen the extent of this slump. 11 points from 12 games would be considered a crisis for most teams. However, for Chelsea it is the humiliation that will be most painful. The calibre of players in their squad means it is surely only a matter of time until they hit a patch of good form and climb the table. The question is: will Mourinho be given enough time to oversee an upturn in their form?
If Mourinho is to arrest the most difficult spell in his career he will not only have to silence his critics outside of Chelsea. Along with the incredibly poor run of form there have been rumours of training ground unrest and a Chelsea player has been quoted as saying (he would) “rather lose than win for Jose Mourinho”. Mourinho is of course no stranger to shaking up the established order at a club. At Real Madrid, he dropped club legend Iker Casillas, causing questions to arise as to whether the dressing room was truly behind him.
The second problem with Chelsea was their transfer dealings in the summer. Nearing the end of the last campaign Chelsea were forced to grind out their results and like any good team that has aspirations of winning the league they did so. Winning by four goals every game when the whole team is in sync is one thing, but it takes a truly solid and mentally hardened team to win a number of games when the majority of the side is out of form.
This is a direct contrast to the Chelsea of this season. With the exception of Willian and Asmir Begovic, the whole squad seems to have hit poor form at the same time. There has been an inability to force their way through to three points which has always been a hallmark of a Mourinho team; stealing a goal and then parking the bus. People disagree over the tactic but it works and has brought the Portuguese huge success.
Therefore after a campaign in which Chelsea struggled to play free flowing football come the turn of the year, the management surely should have seen this problem and attempted to rectify it by bringing in fresh blood that could give the team a different edge. The seemingly permanently out of form Radamel Falcao was brought in on loan along with the acquisitions of Baba Rahman and Asmir Begovic.
While Begovic has been an immediate hit with a string of good performances in the absence of Thibaut Courtois, Rahman has struggled for game time with Kurt Zouma and Cesar Azpilicueta preferred either side of the centre-backs over both Baba and the out of form Ivanovic, while Falcao has managed a solitary goal for Chelsea, which came in a defeat against Crystal Palace.
The saying “form is temporary but class is permanent” is incredibly pertinent as regards the current situation at Chelsea. Eden Hazard, Nemanja Matic and John Terry have all witnessed startling U-turns in their form in the space of one summer. Last season’s player of the year, Hazard, has struggled for goals and any sort of consistency. He has played second fiddle to Brazilian Willian who has been in incredible form thus far, scoring vital goals and attempting to carry the team through their rough period.
Captain John Terry has struggled to cope with the pace of the strikers he has faced having been left hugely exposed by a lack of cover in midfield. Terry’s positional play has always been his strength with his movement and speed an issue. With so many runners moving beyond him this season he has struggled and rightly so. Even the best defender can’t mark two men and Terry has been left with too much to do too often.
In conjunction with this is Matic’s fall from the lofty heights of last season. The 2014-15 accolades went to Hazard but Matic surely must have been in close contention for the player of the season. He was instrumental as he provided a huge asset both offensively and defensively contributing goals and assists along with his stonewall defensive play. He was superb.
This season, he has struggled to reach the same level of performance. He has been overrun in midfield, and a lack of cover in midfield means he is forced towards the man. As he moves to the ball it is offloaded further up the pitch effectively taking him out of that phase of play. His strength last season was his ability to break up play combined with his ability to run, while this season teams have found it far too easy to bypass him.
The simple solution for this would be to place another defensively minded player alongside him such as John Obi Mikel. However, with the inclusion of Mikel, Chelsea have to omit a more attacking player such as Ramires or they push Fabregas into a more forward position therefore sacrificing one of Hazard, Willian or Pedro which is in no way ideal as Chelsea have also struggled for consistency in front of goal this season.
The general form of the team did seem to improve against Stoke. However, it is goals that win matches and good performances do not always equal points and vice versa. Mourinho’s teams have been champions of a style of playing best described as attritional. For years they have been winning by any means necessary, beautiful or ugly.
The failings of the team are just that — of the entire team. It cannot be attributed to just a single factor. The players have been out of form, the transfer policy was not good enough and the manager needs to keep his battles solely on the pitch instead of with the referees and media. Chelsea are a top class team able to beat anyone on their day and they also have one of the best managers in the world. It is of course only a matter of time until they hit form again and when they do they will be looking for revenge for this humiliating run of games.
But how much patience does Abramovich have left? Mourinho has said he will not leave voluntarily and that the only way he would not be Chelsea manager is if his contract expires or if he is fired. But with an owner that has been happy to reshuffle his deck on numerous occasions, if this run of losses continues then he will go from the Special One to the Fired One.
