Chelsea: Cesar Azpilicueta earned his call-up, deserves more minutes
By George Perry
Cesar Azpilicueta is the only Chelsea player in Spain’s World Cup squad. He deserves to be as much a regular in Julen Lopetegui’s starting XI as he is in Antonio Conte’s.
For everything he has proven and accomplished at Chelsea, Cesar Azpilicueta’s international career is remarkably thin. After five years in the squad he has only 21 caps – 14 of which are friendlies. He did not play in any of Spain’s qualifying matches for the 2014 World Cup, and was not even in the squad for three of them. He started in two of Spain’s three games in the 2014 tournament. Azpilicueta went back to the bench for the Euro 2016 qualifiers, playing only in the final qualifying game and nine minutes in the tournament itself.
Julen Lopetegui’s arrival did not do much for him. Once again, he only played in Spain’s final World Cup qualifier, a 1-0 dead rubber against Israel. Yet Lopetegui must see something in Chelsea’s versatile defender. Azpilicueta is in Spain’s World Cup team and Marcos Alonso, Cesc Fabregas, Pedro and Alvaro Morata are not.
Lopetegui favours a four-man defence. Dani Carvajal will be Azpilicueta’s main competition as Spain’s starting right-back. Simply by virtue of playing at Real Madrid, Carvajal likely has the edge in Lopetegui’s eyes. Caravajal has similar defensive statistics as Azpilicueta, but comes nowhere close in terms of Azpilicueta’s complete game.
Azpilicueta had six assists and two goals in the Premier League this season. Carvajal had two assists and no goals. Azpilicueta made his offensive contributions while playing as a centre-back who would regularly push up into the central midfield or wing-back spaces. In addition to playing each position in the back line “formally” over his Chelsea career, Azpilicueta showed his endless versatility by slotting into the midfield and then dropping back to defence during the flow of play.
In explaining his decision not to select Alvaro Morata, Lopetegui cited Iago Aspas’ and Rodrigo Moreno’s ability to play in multiple areas up front. If Lopetegui was looking for offensive options, he seems to have dropped one half of a valuable package by not selecting Morata to link up with Azpilicueta. Azpilicueta’s passes to Morata all came from somewhat deep and just inside the right half-space. Azpilicueta did not need to come high and wide to find Morata.
However, Lopetegui appears to be focussing his centre-forwards on the ground attack. Aspas, Rodrigo and Diego Costa combined for six headed goals this season. Morata scored seven himself in the Premier League. None of the trio on Spain’s squad are aerial threats, which was Morata’s most important contribution for Chelsea’s offence this season.
Lopetegui also neglected the wide crossing threat from Marcos Alonso, let alone his free-kick abilities. Alonso is equally capable of sending low, hard crosses into the box as he is aiming for his centre-forwards’ heads. The combination of the decisions not to select Alonso and not to preserve the Azpilicueta-Morata tandem suggests Lopetegui may expect his full-backs to stay more defensive, and to send the attack through the middle.
This would still justify Azpilicueta’s inclusion in the squad and the starting XI. Cesar Azpilicueta is one of the best defenders in the world, particularly on the ground, as well as one of the most versatile. If he spends most of the time on the bench in Russia, Spain will be squandering a major asset.
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And if that happens and Spain bows out early again, Chelsea watchers will be among the first to point to everything Azpilicueta has done in England and ask “How did you not notice?” On the other hand, if Lopetegui makes good use of Azpilicueta anywhere across the back-line, Azpilicueta may finally receive the attention and credit he deserves as an international.