Chelsea FC are playing some wonderful football at the moment. It’s important to remember that success is built on smart, decisive, long term decision-making and not self-spiting short-sightedness.
Maurizio Sarri has Chelsea moving in the right direction towards his Italian version of Pep Guardiola-ball. Even Ruben Loftus-Cheek is beginning to get some playing time. Even so, let’s remind ourselves not to get too carried away. Yes, Chelsea are unbeaten after 11 Premier League games, but it was naught but two years ago the Blues were playing scintillating football under a different Italian manager and winning 13 games in a row.
This latest Chelsea cycle is a wildly interesting one. The Blues have adapted very well to Sarrismo in these early months, but I am still rather uneasy about certain things that have been left either undecided or poorly handled. Thus, despite the football being wonderful and the season full of wins, I’m worried there’s a chance we won’t see this level of quality for long unless a few things are resolved.
For instance, it says something peculiar about the attitude of the squad that so many members of a winning side of critical darlings have spoken out about leaving the club. What is that about? With Victor Moses, Gary Cahill and Andreas Christensen voicing their unhappiness, Chelsea have to worry more about the culture around the club. The best footballers in the world playing the best football in the world do so in environments in which, if they’re not happy, they’re at least secure and comfortable. They pursue their individual goals within the frame of the club’s plans.
Footballers have shorter careers than most. They have essentially a little bit more than a decade in which to provide for their families and achieve their dreams. They take time very seriously. A club culture that both respects that limited time and rewards the relationship between player and club is culture that sustains top performance amid harmony.
A good example of clubs that get this measure right are Juventus and Bayern Munich. They have certain players who play every match and others who play very little. Yet all are still committed to the larger cause because they’ve found a way to pursue – and achieve! – their own goals through the club.
Chelsea for too long erred on one side of that: The player power side, with the ups and downs that define each of the last few Chelsea cycles (new coach-win-player revolt-fall-new coach). It was necessary when Chelsea were still growing into the club they are now. They needed to offer packages that were cushier and more likely to be accepted in order to attract top-level talent.
Those days are all but over. The club holds a far different status from that of 20-25 years ago. What the club demands of its players, though, has not evolved in parallel.
Chelsea is a damn fine place to pursue every level of a footballing career. Under Sarri they are taking the next step.
It is no longer just about winning, it is about winning a certain way. It is about winning with a style of football appropriate to the ideals of the upper echelons of football’s hierarchy. It is not enough to just win at Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern Munich, Manchester United, yuck Liverpool, Juventus or AC Milan. You must also win with gravitas. Chelsea are now in that class of football club and have yet to realize it in many ways.
Chelsea need players who are as committed to the club as the club is to them so they can grow together. After all, a player can’t win trophies without a club and the clubs can’t win without the players. However, players also have to understand they cannot play every game. Few top clubs have any players other than goalkeepers who play every single match. They simply won’t be able to sustain the level of quality necessary.
Somewhere along the line, there is a break between the expectations of the players and the needs of the club. Would they rather play every single match for a mid-table club that is bereft of European competition or 25-30 for a club at the top level of four competitions?
This is what Chelsea seem to lack in many ways and what worries me about the club moving forward. If they’ve truly decided to do battle at the level of the top clubs that’s a wonderful thing. But to tie themselves to the passions and indiscretions of players who don’t understand that very thing is a mistake. It is something Antonio Conte understood in his feuds with both Diego Costa and David Luiz.
If Chelsea are serious about their football being about more than winning but in how they win, they’ll need players who understand those expectations as well. Players who understand it’s about more than simply playing as much football as possible and starting football matches. The evidence so far this season suggest they have a squad full of players who, though understanding and enjoying the cosmetic side of things, are mistaken in their deeper acceptance of what is happening.
Chelsea must make the right decisions about these players or risk losing the progress the club has made. Both sides are reckoning their futures on this stage of the club’s history.