Burnley inadvertently triggered the next stage of Chelsea’s development under Maurizio Sarri. By man-marking Jorginho, they unleashed creativity among Chelsea’s wingers and midfielders that gave the Blues complete control.
Chelsea’s opening 15 minutes against Burnley presaged an unusual day at Turf Moor. Chelsea were sluggish and incoherent, as though most of the players were still shaking off their exertions against BATE Borisov on Thursday. The Clarets, by contrast, were sharp in their movement and possession. They did not just try to keep the ball away from Chelsea. They made crisp passes, found lazy seams between Chelsea’s lines and looked decidely un-Dyche.
The Blues came into the game between the 15′-20′, but Burnley still wielded influence over their guests. Burnley man-marked Jorginho at nearly all times, and supported this by double- or even triple-teaming him as the Blues’ centre-backs attempted to play the ball out through the centre. A Burnley forward kept a close watch on the ball-far centre-back, closing down the lanes between the ball-carrying centre-back and Jorginho. If the centre-back found a pass to Jorginho, the Clarets would rush to overload him before he could set up the usual passing rhythm.
Jorginho was the first to respond to what was an effective strategy to disrupt Chelsea’s tempo. He moved about 10-15 yards forward of his normal position, expanding the distance between himself and the centre-backs.
This ended Burnley’s ability to mark out him and the centre-backs. If they dropped deep to cover Jorginho, they took the pressure off the centre-backs, added extra distance to any attempts to counter and allowed the centre-backs to move forward and support the offence. If they let Jorginho come forward unmarked so as to preserve their counter-attack outlet and cut off the centre-backs as a recycle option, they would allow to re-establish his station even closer to the final third.
Chelsea’s wingers made the next adjustment. Willian and Pedro would drop deeper towards the full-backs to retrieve the ball near midfield. The Blues’ centre-backs played the ball out to the full-backs, since Jorginho’s markers had removed the centre of the pitch. By the wingers coming back towards the full-backs, each side set up its own pass-and-recycle patterns in place of the standard, centralized Jorginho option.
By the time Pedro came off in the 30′, this adjustment was in full swing. Jorginho played high and central. The wingers dropped deeper and closed the distance to their full-backs. The other midfielders moved forward into the half-spaces to cover the wingers. In a way, this was the perfect situation for Ruben Loftus-Cheek.
For the remaining hour of the game, Chelsea’s formation could best be described as a 4-something-something-1. The back-four were the usual players in their usual roles, and Alvaro Morata was up top. But with two players who are equally capable as wingers and attacking midfielders – Ruben Loftus-Cheek and Ross Barkley – the Blues’ wingers and midfielders moved seamlessly and fluidly into whatever spaces they wanted to.
This created havoc for Burnley’s defenders, who could not match the Blues on quality one-on-one, but could not get a handle on who was where for anything resembling zonal marking. Chelsea barely had a nominal formation upon which Burnley could structure their defence, which by halftime was completely reactive.
At times the Blues were in a 4-1-4-1, with Jorginho in his usual role in front of the centre-backs. Other times, though, he would pinch up to join the forward line, with N’Golo Kante and Cesar Azpilicueta dropping back to cover the centre-backs as Marcos Alonso stayed up.
For some streches of the game the Blues were in a 4-diamond-2, with Jorginho at the base and Morata and Willian at the top. This made Ross Barkley and Alvaro Morata an incisive vertical attack, with Barkley’s passes and shots equally productive.
And for many other spells the Blues were in a 4-4-3 or 4-2-3-1, but the players in each of those positions varied minute-to-minute. Willian is more than happy to dribble, shoot and stay in the centre, during which times Barkley or Loftus-Cheek cover the wing. If Marcos Alonso came far forward, Loftus-Cheek would play a more offensive version of Mateo Kovacic’s cover.
Whereas the Blues are used to having their two wingers switch sides throughout the game, against Burnley they had their two wingers and two midfielders cycle freely through each other’s positions while the whole XI moved through a variety of formations. Maurizio Sarri warned over the summer that he does not get hung up on formations, and advised us not to get bogged down in them either. This is the sort of performance he was talking about.
The first 15 minutes at Turf Moor suggested a worse than the usual frustrating day away to Burnley. Burnley had smart tactics aimed at neutralizing the heartbeat of the Chelsea side. They even looked like they could score an early goal and force Chelsea to come from behind at the Claret Fortress. The Blues, though, completely turned the tables. They overcame Burnley’s challenge, and took a major step forward in their development as well.
Chelsea and Maurizio Sarri should thank Burnley for this well-timed challenge and opportunity to show how far they have come.