Alvaro Morata has had a rough start to the season goal scoring wise. Perhaps by design or chance, he is attempting to become a target man for Chelsea now.
The biggest structural issue holding Chelsea back right now is up top at striker. The Blues need someone to cut back to. Or play a ball through to. Or someone to be on the end of a cross. Or someone to just put the ball in the back of the net.
Olivier Giroud has been handed the main starting role in recent weeks. Eden Hazard called him “the world’s best target man”. And the Frenchman has done well at soaking up space and flicking the ball on to the wingers. But he himself has not scored and West Ham showed how to cope with him.
There is always the off chance Maurizio Sarri does something off the fall to solve the issue such as putting Eden Hazard, Ruben Loftus-Cheek, or Ross Barkley up top. Would those be good ideas? It is hard to tell without seeing it. But what the short term solution seems to be involves training Alvaro Morata for a new role. Whether by Sarri’s choice or his own, Morata is attempting to become a target man (or at least add that skill set to his toolbox).
There are roughly three prevailing notions about Morata. The first, and the nicest, is that his movement is good. The second is that as soon as he receives the ball, he takes a shot no matter what. And the third is that he goes down under the slightest bit of pressure.
The first is what makes Morata useful now. Giroud is a relatively static type of striker who can keep a back line pinned but he will not be stretching them around. Morata is freer than that and can drag players around, but he does not have the instincts to keep them pressed back.
Not yet anyway. In all his recent performances since Hazard’s comments, Morata has more and more often copied things Giroud would normally do. He has dropped in or put his back against an opponent to receive the ball. He has been passing it more frequently when he used to shoot. And since late last season, he has done a much better job of staying on his feet. He still goes down somewhat easily looking for a La Liga foul at times, but it is nowhere near as prevalent as before.
Morata is supposed to be Chelsea’s main man up top right now. But his previous skill set proved inadequate for Sarrismo and he was dropped. Rather than mope, he has looked at why Giroud is favored and he has tried to integrate those skills into his game.
Whether or not Morata can become good enough at being a target man, while maintaining his movement, remains to be seen. His life line right now is that Giroud cannot score either and that Hazard is dragging the team along goal wise, but at some point one or both of those circumstances will change. When they do, Morata needs to show that he is willing to grow as a player and learn new things that will help the team.
And he needs to score. He really needs to score. Otherwise, come January, Chelsea will need to find a new idea for the striker role.