FROM STAMFORD BRIDGE – Chelsea moved again into the highest half of the Premier League on Sunday with a gritty 3-2 win at residence to Brighton & Hove Albion.
Yeah, therein lies a little bit of an issue.
The Blues aren’t used to combating for place in the midst of the pack. With an expenditure in extra of £1bn since Todd Boehly and BlueCo took management of the membership, it is an much more regarding prospect that they are not competing for pole.
The Graham Potter experiment did not even final a full season and Mauricio Pochettino is now the person entrusted with attempting to mature a workforce full to the Cobham altering room-brim of younger gamers.
It is fairly a pure match. Pochettino’s greatest work in his profession has come when guiding youthful sides, his worst when overpowered by a glamour challenge.
Sadly for Pochettino, he is walked right into a state of affairs combining the worst facets of each. Chelsea have been recklessly spending file sums on unproven gamers and assembled a squad that’s nonetheless a great distance away from shedding their adolescence. His more and more fiery philosophy had solely added extra gasoline to that inferno.
That is been made clear already this season and was greatest on show on Sunday towards Brighton. Conor Gallagher – the stand-in captain for Reece James, who was despatched off in final week’s 4-1 drubbing at Newcastle United – acquired his personal marching orders for 2 foolish yellow-card offences.
The Blues had been cruising at 2-0 halfway via the primary half and created one other nice probability within the brief time between Facundo Buonanotte’s objective and Gallagher’s dismissal.
No matter Pochettino preached to his gamers at half-time labored. They had been a workforce in determined want of rising up quick and a dogged second-half show duly adopted.
Chelsea dropped off – not right into a deep block, however they did not precisely play the notorious Ange Postecoglou high-line both – and minimize off the areas for Brighton’s tough wingers to have a lot room for manoeuvre, shortened their margin for error.
The lighting-quick tempo of Mykhailo Mudryk (or ‘Ukraine Bolt’ as he is recognized in some on-line circles) harm Roberto De Zerbi’s males on the counter, finally forcing James Milner right into a determined last-ditch lunge and incomes a penalty after a VAR verify.
Joao Pedro finally diminished the objective deficit again to 1 in added time and Chelsea wanted one other VAR assessment to have a penalty towards them overturned, however this was a stark distinction to a few of their different self-destructive performances within the Pochettino period.
With 11 males, Chelsea additionally displayed the traits of a typical Pochettino workforce and confirmed why they’ve traditionally competed properly with possession-based footballing sides.
Brighton needed a gradual sport from the off. They did not need to be dragged into chaos. With their accidents, that is comprehensible, however even with their key gamers obtainable it is merely a design flaw in De Zerbi’s system once they do get drawn into firefights.
Chelsea had been pleased to cede possession however they had been energetic and purposeful once they had it. Pochettino groups are supposed to outrun you in matches of frenzy, to dominate you in bodily duels. Crash, bang, wallop. Not in a route-one sense. but it surely’s no shock they scored two crashing headers from corners.
That’s the blueprint for the Blues. If they do not lose the bodily combat, they in all probability will not lose the sport of soccer. Now they only must cease letting their sizzling hearts flip into sizzling heads.
