Predictable Chelsea FC Need The Unpredictable Kenedy
As Chelsea FC enter a period without Diego Costa, Kenedy could well be the answer to the club’s problems.
Last year as opposition’s fans bellowed ‘Boring Boring Chelsea!’ we knew it was merely a façade of frustration—they knew how the Blues would line up, they knew how we’d play, and they knew their squad couldn’t crack it. This season Chelsea not only are decidedly boring, their predictable and virtually unchanged (sans Pedro) team has begun this year’s campaign stumbling like a giraffe with four legs of different lengths.
POPULAR: Chelsea FC Lacking On-Field Leadership
Some called for problems to be fixed with dumptrucks full of cash parked outside of Paul Pogba’s villa in Turin. Others called for the heads of last year’s stalwarts as Branislav Ivanovic, John Terry, Nemanja Matic and Eden Hazard all stood trial for substandard performances. Perhaps in order to regain the confident stability of yesteryear’s Chelsea, we need an injection of unpredictability.
What made Chelsea so good was an array of threats most teams just couldn’t cope with. If you devoted all energies to blockading Chelsea’s attack, you still had to score to win—and, well, good luck. Smart money was always on Hazard, Oscar, Cesc Fabregas and/or Diego Costa combining in some devastating way. It was predictable only in the names involved, but not in execution.
This year, the same group has been stagnant, allowing predictability to infiltrate execution, propagating uninspired football. With Costa out (#campaign), Willian nursing a hamstring, a fragile Oscar and Fabregas doing god knows what, fortunately, in Kenedy we have a player whose name is even too unpredictable for autocorrect.
Bad joke aside, Kenedy might be the wild card Jose Mourinho needs to play in matches. Jose’s history when his sides’ brutish goalscoring talisman is away suggests he’ll fortify the potential for a point with every limb of every body protecting our goal—final third be damned. But given the Blues’ shakiness in defense, relying on that bunch could see our hopes of a title defense dashed before Halloween.
Though Kenedy has featured in some of our more embarrassing efforts in the Premier League (1-3 Everton, 1-2 Crystal Palace) it’s only been as a substitute. But if you remember, the only memorable things to come out of the Everton match was Matic’s strike and a GIF of Kenedy executing a baby elastico. The Brazilian may only be 19, but whether through youthful exuberance or this truly being his baseline confidence, the eagerness in his play is something that we’ve been missing.
More from Chelsea FC News
- Bournemouth vs Chelsea: 1 Blue Mauricio Pochettino should drop
- Bournemouth vs Chelsea: 3 Blues who must start
- Predicted Chelsea lineup vs Bournemouth: Palmer starts in 4-2-3-1
- Chelsea sporting directors finally reveal why they sign so many young players
- These 3 new signings may never get a game at Chelsea
The kid runs at people. The only way to get a defender to make a decision is to dally on the ball or run at him. When you dally, unless you’re Lionel Messi, you become reactionary and defensive—the roles switch. When you run at a defender, he’s forced to make a decision, and sometimes—through various mixtures of skill and luck—if the defender guesses right he can still be wrong. Kenedy loves throwing defenders into that brain-blender.
Evidence of unpredictability’s effect led to Kenedy’s assist against Walsall. The defenders backed off him so much he was able to foxtrot with the ball before picking out Ramires with a deftly arced cross. For his goal, Kenedy used a knifing run from the opposite side of the pitch and a beautiful first time touch pass by Ruben Loftus-Cheek to slot the ball under the keeper. And still my favorite part of his debut Chelsea goal was the celebration—vulnerability and delight mixed together in a telling knee slide.
Newcastle, Porto, and Southampton all await Chelsea within a week’s time. Rotating the squad and maintaining its confidence across competitions is always tricky. Mainly because confidence is such a fickle beast to wrangle, but when Jose Mourinho gets hold of some, he seems to know how to weaponize it. In Kenedy he has an artillery of confidence awaiting the ‘fire’ command.
Next: Chelsea FC, The Victims Of A Biblical Battle