The Chelsea boss must adapt his game as the sport moves forward.
The Universe and football are old, old friends. Individually they’ve been vexing enough to elude full human understanding for at least six billion and 200 years respectively. At times the old pals get together, clink together their pints, and set a stage that no mortal could see coming. Such will be the spectacle of Jose Mourinho and Chelsea FC welcoming Jurgen Klopp and Liverpool to Stamford Bridge during the most vulnerable time in Blues boss’ managerial career.
On the surface it would seem a head-to-awkwardly-long-puffy-coat matchup with Arsenal would be the poetic cruelty preferred. But Jose has the clear advantage there. Sure, if Arsene Wenger sent Mourinho packing from Stamford Bridge with a brilliant display of one-touch tiny human football it would seem satisfying for those who Mourinho often makes see red. In the end though, they’d be too weary to relish. Mourinho has Wenger’s number and as petulant and boisterous as Jose can be, Arsene is to the similar extents stubborn, cold and hard to care about.
After tossing out Arsenal as the perfect opponent for a Jose do-or-die match, you instantly slide in either Manchester outfit. City brushed Chelsea’s “little horses” aside to claim the title two years ago but those horses grew up and avenged themselves a year later. And that’s the issue with them: City are too good right now. Given Chelsea’s struggles, the neutral observer would see this matchup as unfair.
United had a more recent and worse loss than Chelsea as they lost to Championship side Middlesbrough on Wednesday thanks to a collection of putridly taken penalties. This proving United to be too unpredictable for either a concise conclusion to Mourinho’s career or a fresh foreword to Chelsea’s new beginnings.
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This only leaves Liverpool. While Mourinho has a mixed history with Liverpool, the conspiring forces that chose them for this duel didn’t do so by default: in fact, it most likely was the plan all along. The only, truly proper foe had to be Klopp’s Liverpool.
Football always changes. It prides itself on being difficult to pin down, and that’s part of its charm. Though the rudimentary aim of the game is simple: get the ball into your opponent’s net more times than them—it’s complicated by two sets of 11 players, rules, and one ball. The result is a seemingly simple math problem, but with a solar system of potential solutions. It also means the sport can evolve nearly overnight—and the football Jose Mourinho is comfortable with is now in the sports’ rearview mirror.
Jose hoards control. His tactics hinge on the sole idea of controlling the match. Whether it’s infamously parking the bus or playing a 90-minute game of keep away or kicking off a match with no striker—Jose wants, and needs, control. It’s his ability to squeeze control out of vastly different, ever changing and tiringly persistent scenarios which made him the winner he is. But as football has changed, it’s also become a major component of his demise.
You can thank Klopp’s Borussia Dortmund, the spread of large sums of money to mediocre clubs, the rise of the German National Team, or just football herself becoming bored with current suitors: the game evolved. Chaotic athleticism is the style She’s flirting with now. And nothing is a bigger turn-off to this exotic beauty than control.
A surplus of athletes has allowed the sport to stop relying solely on tactics to create opportunities. Now, a rush of blood, loss of traction, or moment of hesitation can lead to a chance. Football is falling in love with the taboo fringes created by infallible humans playing an imperfect sport—and they’re now part of tactical plans. Run, press, run, cut off passing lanes, run, trap, press, run, harry, run, run, run, run, run.
And it’s been working. So well in fact that a prototypical #10, while nice to have, isn’t required. Apart from Lionel Messi, the best players in the world right now are wingers. Run, press, run, tackle, run, take on, run, shoot, run, run, run, run.
The catalyst to this movement has unquestionably been Jürgen Klopp. His Borussia Dortmund squads took on the biggest footballing machine in Europe, Bayern Munich, and won. Not just once, but to the tune of two Bundesliga titles—the first a ten point topping of Munich in the final league table, the second by an eight point margin.
In challenging the best and toppling them in successive seasons, they became a cult favorite. The team was in demand, the city was in demand, Klopp was in demand, and that style was in demand.
The team besides Bayern that has felt the effects of this has been Chelsea under Jose Mourinho. This season Chelsea has looked a step too slow to grab hold of the control they need to be successful. Instead they’ve stumbled about helplessly like a grandpa locked in a day care chasing 11 kids on a sugar high.
Cesc Fabregas is only 28 but he looks twice that age (with the occasional glaucoma flare-up). Branislav Ivanovic has been the human embodiment of the famous movie line “I’m getting’ too old for this shit.” And Eden Hazard needs a nap.
As a result, Mourinho, unable to answer questions or solve the problem to recover the control he’s lost, has lost control of himself. He’s always used public spats with star players, the needling of referees, and media mind games to lead football back into his arms.
But recently these antics have taken a more sinister tone: he’s already been charged multiple times by the FA, fined, and given a suspended suspension(?). And Thursday revealed another consequence of Jose’s over-erratic behavior as former Chelsea Team Doctor Eva Carneiro filed a lawsuit against the club.
These are the forces Mourinho is up against, and he has to evolve to survive.
It’s my belief that Jose can exist, and be just as successful, in this world too. After all, playing this style requires meticulous discipline, covering, and the half step quicker reaction that preparedness affords you. This should all sound familiar; it’s basically the framework upon which the Chelsea Bus was built.
Treating his managerial post like an ‘Us Against the World’ Boys Club is how Jose gets his players to cling to him, and their tactical duties, with a maelstrom of valiance. It’s beautiful to watch if you’re a supporter, teeth grindingly maddening if you aren’t. All it requires is a tweak to fit the current landscape.
Step 1) Say a fond farewell to the old Chelsea Bus, thank her, then splice that beloved monstrosity into quarters and stuff each with ‘Mad Max: Fury Road’ style enginery.
It’s possible this process started at the Britannia on Tuesday versus Stoke City. If it weren’t for the all-world performance of Stoke goalkeeper Jack Butland, Chelsea would have erupted. Still, Blues fans saw something from their team that had been absent all season: our athletes looking the better ones. Control was sacrificed for a reliance on youth and a shuffling of player placement, allowing Hazard to pick up the ball in less predictable and more dangerous spaces. As a result, he looked like a good player again.
More of the same, please.
Next: Chelsea FC Host Liverpool: Predict The Line-Up
Life being life, sport being sport, and football’s penchant for poetic storylines being football’s penchant for poetic storylines: Jose Mourinho must face Jurgen Klopp in a match most believe the result of which could usher the former into unemployment.
We live. We die. We live again.