Chelsea Tactics and Transfers: Conte out, Sarri in, nothing changes

Chelsea exchanged Antonio Conte for Maurizio Sarri, but the root issues at the club remain the same. This club does not know who they are, and does not care that they don’t.

Antonio Conte was finally relieved from his role as head coach of Chelsea FC last week. The powerbrokers at the West London club waited an absurd amount of time to make their decision on the issue, which was odd as it seemed an open piece of knowledge for everyone in the world of football.

Now I myself am something of an Antonio Conte fan. Those of you who have read the column for a while will know that. Maybe even some of you followed my absurd #CampaignConteStays on the tweet machine.

The reason for this is simple. As a Chelsea supporter who is actually far less emotionally-motivated on the issue than I like to pretend to be (pure dry sports talk without acknowledging the human element is just too boring) I think it’s fairly obvious Chelsea are further from their goals now than they were two years ago, and even further now than perhaps 6-10 years back.

Football is a game of hearts and minds. It’s called the beautiful game for a reason. Not because of the way it looks when you’re watching, but because of how it feels to play and because – unlike any other sport (though some come close) – it ties together character, motivation, athleticism, art, philosophy, competition, passion and history all at once.

Forgive my propensity for the grandiose. What I am saying it that it means something. Football really means something. Above a simplified sport of kicking a round ball there is a plane few players, clubs, coaches or supporters get a chance to ascend to.

Football is a game in which the ideas matter as much or more than the practice. This means the coach must be more highly valued for a player or a club to reach the next level. It’s very easy to be good in football, but to be great is to be something different. To be more than a team that scores more goals than it concedes and to really represent something, to be the protagonist of a story is something worth fighting for.

To take a term from Antonio Conte, football is worth suffering for.

Few clubs in the world are bigger than Chelsea. That in itself is a success for the board and all of the supporters. But if the plan is to grow beyond the Bayern Munich’s and Real Madrid’s of the world, Chelsea must at some point stop repeating the mistakes that have them repeatedly bashing their heads against the ideological ceiling.

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Antonio Conte was perfect for Chelsea. Here was a man dedicated to self-improvement and hard work. As a player he was acknowledged less for being a wonderful footballer than being a lion. He could be the heart and soul of any team. And he was of one of the best ever as Juventus captain, a team in which he commanded the respect of Alessandro Del Piero, Zinedine Zidane and Pavel Nedved. Conte could very well have gone on to bleed that identity into Chelsea for a decade or more, had they let him.

Chelsea, by they way, don’t have a single player of that quality no matter how good they think they are.

Sometimes you hear the loathsome idiot who makes throwaway remarks like “that can’t happen in the modern game” in reference to a manager staying a decade or more like Sir Alex Ferguson. Why not? Why tie the future to the present, and accept the present as the way it is? Why shouldn’t Chelsea align themselves with the spirit of someone like Sir Alex Ferguson instead of the multitude of mediocrities churning through spiritless manager?

There’s no reason Chelsea could not have kept Antonio Conte for 10 years and built a proper identity and team to fight against the bigger clubs of the world.

Which brings us back to the fundamental issue. Chelsea have lacked an identity for years. This lack of identity is a problem beyond what people accept and will continue to mar their successes only until it doesn’t.

Players don’t win titles and trophies. Players win games. Teams win titles and trophies. Teams are bound by a sense of identity that unifies not only the 11 men on the field but those on the bench, the staff those in the stadium and everyone at the training ground.

The identity of a club far outlasts any player or coach. Chelsea repeatedly lay the first brick and then annihilate it, each time starting again, time and time again.

The last time Chelsea really were close to forming an identity was under Jose Mourinho. It outlasted Mourinho himself, but what did it do? It carried the club for the better part of a decade. Chelsea were that Mourinho team under several successive managers and eventually that team won the Champions League in the club’s most glorious achievement to date.

They should not have fired Mourinho the first time. He should have stayed and been allowed to fight and to suffer. More is learnt about who people are when things are going wrong than when they’re going well. If Chelsea hadn’t fired Mourinho then and hurt him so deeply, they could very well be talking about 2-3 Champions League triumphs and being a club celebrating it’s tenth title.

But, no. They fired Jose Mourinho mid-season after a few minor struggles. They embarrassed him after two consecutive title wins, a record points total that was only recently broken and heartbreaking Champions League losses that helped usher in goal line technology.

Then, lo and behold, almost a decade later, a different, jaded and less pure Mourinho later, they found another man in Antonio Conte who could do the same. Only under Antonio Conte did Mourinho’s spirit and identity finally leave the club. That alone is an achievement

Did he at times ask too much? Of course he did. What chaser of history settles for good enough?  Was he too firey at times? Of course he was. There were obvious mistakes but were they all his fault? The Diego Costa situation was uncomfortable, but think about who you are if your side is Costa’s. They should have made amends for their respective benefits. It’s wonderful to hear Costa has finally decided to take himself and his profession seriously. His talent demands it. But he and Conte could have been perfect.

The text situation was bad, but people speak through text now. You’ve probably checked a text since you started reading this. Conte informed his player he was no longer in his plans.  Mourinho, Guardiola, Zidane and Klopp all text their players. There’s nothing wrong with it.

Diego Costa used it as an excuse to get out because he wanted out. That was all. Conte texted him and Costa saw an opportunity to make the most of it. That is exactly who they both are.  Conte was straightforward, honest and to-the-point with a player selfish enough to almost destroy a title-bid to move to China. Meanwhile, Costa was opportunist and decisive. He forced the narrative to get what he wanted. In the end they both got what they wanted. Is anyone even really to blame?

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Antonio Conte could have forged the new era-defining identity Chelsea really need. Chelsea do not have the financial resources of Manchester United, Real Madrid or Barcelona so they need other things. They need unity, discipline, dedication and raw determination to succeed.  Antonio Conte is dedicated to each of those qualities and demanded the same of his players. They would have learned, but instead Chelsea have pushed the panic button again.

Now they have Maurizio Sarri, a good manager. A phenomenal one, in fact. A football student of the top order, no doubt. Please resist the urge to blunder through the idea of nuance and assume that liking Conte makes someone prejudiced against Sarri.

RESIST THE URGE.

Napoli played wonderful football and stood up to the most dominant domestic force in the history of their country. That is a wonderful thing to do and absolutely something worth trying at Chelsea.

But that doesn’t change the fact Chelsea are back to square one again. With Chelsea’s propensity for demolition, they’ll never get to the second or even third levels of philosophy-driven football where the giants truly live. If Chelsea want to really grow, they will need to start treating the plane beyond the pitch as important as it is. Until then, they’ll continue to look up in envy from their self-perpetuated purgatory, while the other clubs live in the heavens.

Chelsea have done the right thing by chasing the players Maurizio Sarri actually wants, a courtesy they barely extended to Antonio Conte, mind you. But Sarri is drinking from a poisoned chalice.

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One can only hope that finally, perhaps, the club will actually aid him. In the process they must resist their own urge to cast him aside with such viciously vampiric verve.

NB: “Tactics and Transfers” is Barrett Rouen’s weekly column, appearing every Monday morning. The title should not be construed as a guarantee that he will actually discuss tactics and / or transfers.