Chelsea playing with no semblance of tactical or personal cohesion
By George Perry
Chelsea’s XI have been playing more like 11 individuals than one well-drilled, title-defending squad. Their three consecutive draws reveal a side without the rapport necessary to bring individual talents to fruition.
Back-heels that spring the ball into empty space. Point-to-point passing plays that are now as predictable as they were once breath-taking. Disparate passing triangles that do not connect with each other or into a grander scheme.
Chelsea are playing like a side brought together for an star-studded exhibition to raise money for charity. Each player is high calibre in his own right, and at least four of them are truly world-class. But unlike last season, these Blues are not playing as one force sharing one mind, one vision. Instead, they are each going about their business in isolation, making it easy for the opposition to mark out the ball and close down any attempt at a build-up sequence.
Chelsea have struggled with this all season, but the recent run of three draws has made these issues more obvious. Against Arsenal on Wednesday in the Carabao Cup, Chelsea had three three-man passing batteries that dominated the possession maps. First was the back-line of Antonio Rudiger, Andreas Christensen and Cesar Azpilicueta passing horizontally to each other. Next was a triangle on the right between Azpilicueta, Danny Drinkwater and Victor Moses. And the last was on the left between Rudiger, Marcos Alonso and Cesc Fabregas.
Each of these was an almost entirely self-contained unit. Fabregas was nearly Eden Hazard’s personal valet, as he laid the ball up for the Belgian to create and served as an outlet if Hazard needed a relief to find more space. The two flanks barely communicated with each other via the midfield, and no one offered regular service to Alvaro Morata.
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In transition and on defence, Chelsea do not create the overloads that allowed them to dominate the run of play last season. The switch to the 3-5-2 is a significant component of this. Morata and Hazard are not suited to the high press the way Willian and Pedro are. However, the extra midfielder should allow Chelsea to choke off attempts to play the ball out. But Cesc Fabregas is no more suited to the role than either of Chelsea’s strikers. Danny Drinkwater pushed N’Golo Kante into a very deep position against Arsenal, negating the Frenchman’s utility in the press. And Tiemoue Bakayoko is day-to-day in terms of his contributions to the fluidity of the Blues’ play or the integrity of the midfield.
As a result, the best the Blues can muster are one-on-one encounters as the opponent builds the play out of their own half, and attempts to block the obvious passing lanes. Chelsea are no longer swarming the ball-carrier with a winger, a wing-back and a midfielder as they could last year. Notably, Arsenal did this to Chelsea last week with great success.
Chelsea players no longer have the intuitive sense of where there teammates are and where they are about to go. When Eden Hazard or Willian blindly back-heels a pass, they need to know where someone will be running onto it and someone needs to anticipate the trickery and be in motion before it happens. Cesc Fabregas, who has created scoring chances for a litany of the game’s top strikers, still does not know how, when or where Alvaro Morata likes the ball. And when players pinch forward on a press or counter, someone needs to cover other than N’Golo Kante dropping deeper and deeper.
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Perhaps some of the answers lie about town rather than just at Cobham. The Blues do not seem to have the personal chemistry they had last season any more than the tactical cohesion. Antonio Conte may need to turn back the clock on his team psychology sessions and send the lads out for long, loud night. The fitness coaches and nutrition staff can do damage control the next day.