Chelsea FC Only Team That Can Carry England’s Hopes In The Champions League
By Ellis Lasher
Since 2011, Chelsea FChas been the sole carrier of England’s hopes on the great European stages: having won the trophy in 2012, the Blues were the only English team to reach the semi-finals of the UEFA Champions League in the past three season.
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Chelsea FC is once again strong favorites to reach the latter knockout stages this year, but let’s compare their campaign with the other three English teams’ in the tournament:
Manchester City got paired up with German powerhouse Bayern Munich but were still expected to beat AS Roma and CSKA Moscow, which they failed to do, and now they sit at the bottom with 2 points from a possible 12. It is still possible, though unlikely, that they finish second.
Liverpool have trophy-holders Real Madrid in their group but managed to sit in third place behind Swiss league champions Basel. Their hopes of making it to the top 16 is still within their hands though.
Arsenal are second in their group behind a Dortmund with a double personality disorder (perfect UCL start vs. their worst start in the league), yet the way the gunners threw a 3-goal lead away to Anderlecht suggest that they don’t stand a chance against the big boys.
Completing the quartet of English teams, Chelsea FC was handed an easier group with Schalke, Sporting CP and UCL newcomers NK Maribor. Despite having drawn two games, they sit atop the group and a victory against either Schalke or Sporting will see them progress to the round of 16.
With results like these, it is obvious that the Premier League’s influence on the European competition is fading.
It is safe to say that Chelsea FC is one of the best teams in Europe: they are unbeaten in all competitions after 16 games. Orchestrated by a tactical genius in Jose Mourinho, they believe they can beat anyone. In comparison, Brendan Rodgers chose to field a weak team to face Real Madrid, admitting that he did not expect his team to win.
But why such a decline in European presence? It is mostly due to the migration of talent out of the Premier League observed in recent years: Suarez was the league’s best player, so was Gareth Bale a year earlier, and where are they now? That’s right, Spain.
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Why isn’t Chelsea showing the same this decline? Because they haven’t sold their best players to other leagues (Hazard was strongly linked to moves to PSG and yet it did not happen); even better, they brought in top-class players from other leagues: Courtois and Costa featured in the LIGA BBVA Team of the Season last year.
Chelsea has the experience as well as the individual talent, their depth allows them to perform well even when missing a player or two. Their strength resides in team effort and discipline. Most BPL tems seem to lack these qualities.
In short , unless Pellegrini realizes that losing at home to CSKA is not something you should be proud of, and unless someone teaches Balotelli the offside rule, it looks like Chelsea FC are going to be the only English team to go far in the competition once again.
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