Know your enemy: Mauricio Pochettino undoes another new Chelsea coach

Mauricio Pochettino did his homework and once again brought a new Chelsea manager’s streak to a crashing halt. “It is wise to study the ways of one’s adversary. Don’t you think?” – Jack Ryan

Maurizio Sarri took a record-setting 12-game Premier League unbeaten streak to Tottenham on Saturday evening. Just under two years ago, Antonio Conte took a record-setting 13-game Premier League winning streak to Tottenham on a Wednesday night. Five Chelsea players and six Spurs started both games, and Martin Atkinsson oversaw both. But the most important man each time to end Chelsea’s streaks was Mauricio Pochettino.

Conte and Sarri built their streaks on a new formation and a new style of play. Conte’s was more innovative in terms of the Premier League as a whole, which is why it spawned a number of imitators and spin-offs that can still be seen today. Maurizio Sarri’s was more dramatic within Chelsea FC, though.

By the halfway mark of both coaches’ streaks, opponents started to identify and counteract vulnerabilities. Teams started to notice how much space Marcos Alonso and Victor Moses vacated when the wingbacks moved forward in 2016/17. They also noticed how Alonso was not fast enough to recover if the play went over or past him, and that Victor Moses was a strong wing-back, but was still a winger by years of training.

Opponents also saw how makeshift Conte’s backline was. Even though Chelsea conceded only four goals during the 13 wins, they knew Cesar Azpilicueta was one of the world’s most talented and versatile defenders – but he was not a centre-back. They knew Gary Cahill was a rugged centre-back, but he was neither fast, agile nor particularly useful in playing out from the back. And they knew that whereas David Luiz could do wonders with the ball at this feet, he was only a part-time resident – mentally and physically – of his position at the back.

Jump ahead to this season. Manchester United assigned Juan Mata to stay near Jorginho. Mata is not the most threatening defensive man-marker, but he gave Jorginho something to think about. United also showed how Chelsea have not yet internalized Sarrismo. When the going got tough, Sarrismo got going right out the door and the Blues resorted to long balls and attempted second balls.

In the following matchweek, Burnley opened the game with 20 minutes in which they should have scored and during which Jorginho had no opportunity to establish the rhythm of the game. Burnley assigned Jorginho two shadows, which flummoxed the Italian until he simply moved 10-15 yards forward, stretched his markers and re-established control.

Chelsea still won 4-0.

Crystal Palace – the next Premier League opponent – went even further. They took away Chelsea’s usual passing lanes out from the back while closing down the Jorginho option. This forced the wingers to drop deep and Jorginho to continue moving forward. Chelsea had to hoof the ball over the full-backs and over the wingers for the wingers to run onto it. The Sarrismo 4-3-3 was looking… what’s the word… plastic.

But Chelsea won by 3-1.

Next was Everton, who assigned two full-time markers to Jorginho and dynamically closed down Chelsea passing lanes. The Toffees pressed the full-backs and deep-dropping wingers hard as the Blues tried to play out, then congested the centre of the pitch when the Blues came narrow. Jorginho did not lead the team in passes per minute for the first time since opening day, and was the first player brought off.

This resulted in the second scoreless draw of the season: 0-0 against Everton.

Mauricio Pochettino did to Maurizio Sarri what he did to Antonio Conte. He learned from every game that came before, developed a tactical plan that addressed each of Chelsea’s known vulnerabilities and tied it together with the quality of his players.

Pochettino countered Antonio Conte with a 3-4-2-1 of his own, having only switched to a three-man defence the previous game. This enabled him to create one-on-one battles with the wing-backs, with the much-faster Kyle Walker against Marcos Alonso. Once in the patch of space behind Chelsea’s wing-backs, Spurs looked for the cross to split Chelsea’s centre-backs. They found it twice, with Christian Eriksen and Dele Alli linking up for two nearly identical goals.

At Wembley on Saturday, Pochettino tasked Dele Alli to never be more than arm’s reach away from Jorginho when the Blues had possession. To say Dele shadowed, pocketed or blanketed Jorginho would be an understatement.

Christian Eriksen and Heung-Min Son complemented Dele’s anti-Jorginho maneuvers. This freed up Moussa Sissoko in midfield. As Jorginho did what somewhat worked in the preceding games – move further up the pitch towards the forwards – he vacated the entire midfield as Mateo Kovacic was trying to support Eden Hazard on the left and N’Golo Kante was periodically the furthest Blue forward.

This left 20-30 yards – sometimes more – between Chelsea’s deepest midfielder (the now way out of position Jorginho) and the defensive line. Lurking in between were Dele, Son, Sissoko and Eriksen, with Harry Kane milling about up top. Tottenham could start every press, counter and attack with a multi-man advantage.

It obviously did not help that David Luiz spend significant periods of time nearer to Mateo Kovacic than to Antonio Rudiger. At least Kante was only out of his best position, not his actual position.

Tottenham pressed Chelsea high and hard for the first 20 minutes, during which time they pressed high and hard at every opportunity. They opened the game to induce Chelsea into their early-second half disorganization against United.

They denied Chelsea tempo and build-up by taking Jorginho out of the game. By pressing the defence they exposed how porous and vulnerable the defence is without any midfielder – not even Jorginho, let alone N’Golo Kante – in front to protect them.

Tottenham so thoroughly succeeded that by the time they settled back and allowed Chelsea prolonged possession – around the 30′, with a 2-0 lead – the Blues acted as they the press was always coming. They rushed passes and tried to go straight over the top, even though Tottenham were not coming at them. In doing so, they gave the ball right back to Spurs who were in their deeper defensive positions.

Like the pigeons being shocked when they press the bar for more cocaine, Chelsea were conditioned into thinking every half-movement by a Spurs player was the next press. Chelsea finished the game with their usual 60% possession. But instead of suffering with the ball, they were panicking with the ball.

4-0 win at Burnley. 3-1 win over Crystal Palace. 0-0 against Everton. 2-1 loss to Tottenham.

I wrote last week about the cultural and club-level differences between Chelsea and Tottenham. This game revealed a key difference in the managers. Maurizio Sarri excels at implementing a base formation and system for an entire season. The Sarrismo 4-3-3 he started in matchweek 4 of 2015/16 at Napoli is different mostly in personnel and hue of blue from the 4-3-3 at Wembley.

But game to game and within games, Sarri is not a responsive tactician. He relies on his system to overwhelm his opponents, whoever they are. Whatever opposition research he does has little bearing on his overall approach to a game.

Mauricio Pochettino, on the other hand, is the game-by-game tactical master. He can beat any manager on any day, and his immense preparation for and understanding of his opponents shows itself in his gameplans. He does not have the campaign-level “point of deviation” base that he can tweak as necessary while always providing stability and identity, which is part of why (as I talked about in the previous article) Pochettino can win big games but cannot bring home a trophy.

Much of the next few weeks will be about whether Maurizio Sarri has, is capable of developing and is willing to implement a Plan B. His history points to no. Mauricio Pochettino, on the other hand, is a series of Plan B’s, or at least endless variations of Plan A.

Neither have won any trophies, so all is equal in the big picture. But on the day at Wembley, like an earlier day at White Hart Lane, Pochettino dismantled his Chelsea counterpart.