Chelsea’s interest in Gonzalo Higuain is the worst kind of “FIFA thinking”
By George Perry
Chelsea’s supposed interest in Gonzalo Higuain is the kind of “FIFA thinking” that abounds on Twitter but should have no place in an actual front office.
The most common “FIFA thinking” around Chelsea is the clamoring for Emerson Palmieri to replace Marcos Alonso because pace. ChelsTwit quants will go so far as to cite his 77 acceleration and 77 speed ratings. The broader form of FIFA thinking, though, is expecting that when a player is transplanted from one setting to another that his output will 100% transfer to his new team.
Is there a goal-machine No. 9 somewhere in Germany? He should lead Chelsea’s line. Is there a creative midfielder serving up clever passes under the radar in Russia? He can purge all memories of Cesc Fabregas? Did Maurizio Sarri have one season of success in Italy three years ago with a player? Sign. Him. Up.
This if FIFA thinking. Remove as much context as you’d like: the team, the league, the coach, the tactics, the level of play, the player’s then vs. now. Whatever he did there and then he will do here and now once you add him to your lineup.
If Chelsea or any other club want to assess a transfer prospect by these overlaps, they need to do so intelligently. They need to move proximal to distal along the football continuum – that is, weight the team more heavily than the league or the coach – and factor in the effects of time on the player and those contexts.
Travis discusses in the adjacent article why Michy Batshuayi would be less of a gamble than Gonzalo Higuain. Let’s look at it differently, through this context lens. Michy Batshuayi played 1.5 of the last two seasons at Chelsea FC in the Premier League. He has played with every player in the best XI + 6 except for Jorginho and Kepa Arrizabalaga. Batshuayi has the added advantage of having played regularly with the man who would be most important to him on the pitch – Eden Hazard – on their national team.
Batshuayi has a high and recent level of familiarity with the players, the club and the league. The only thing new would be the coach and his tactics.
Gonzalo Higuain is the complete opposite. He has never played in the Premier League. He has only played 14 games against Premier League teams in his career. The only Blue he has playing experience with is Jorginho and that, like his experience with Sarri, is three years old.
Those three years are not just any three years. Those three years are the difference between a player at his prime and a player thoroughly on the downslope of his career. Gonzalo Higuain is not Cristiano Ronaldo. The slope will only get steeper.
Even this approach, though, does not fully mitigate the risks, highlighting the complete vacuity of FIFA thinking. Jorginho played three years for Maurizio Sarri at Napoli and then followed him to Chelsea. They have a long, uninterrupted working relationship, and Sarri wanted Jorginho specifically to provide continuity of tactics. Although the team and leagues are different, this is a relatively strong case.
Yet Jorginho has done little for Chelsea or Sarri’s efforts to impose his vision on the club. Jorginho has been the epitome of Chelsea’s masturbatory keep-ball when he was supposed to be the midfield maestro of timing, pace of play and prying apart the opposition. He did those things quite well at Napoli, but nothing other than the volume of his passing has carried over to Stamford Bridge.
light. Related Story. Chelsea's FIFA 19 ratings: What they are vs. what they should really be
Chelsea’s past offers an even starker example. The Blues bought Fernando Torres in the hopes that he and Rafael Benitez would make Chelsea’s 2012/13 look like El Nino’s glory years at Liverpool. Same manager, same league, same level of play within the league (i.e., top six), continuity of play within the league and only two years apart from the manager.
We all know what happened next.
If Chelsea want Gonzalo Higuain, fine. We can debate that for months. My colleague Hugo has been doing just that. But if Chelsea want Higuain that move must be predicated on elements of his current attributes and skills that will transfer to Chelsea in the Premier League in 2019. Not what he did in Napoli three years ago with Maurizio Sarri.
Next. Chelsea should roll the dice on Michy Batshuayi, not Gonzalo Higuain. dark
FIFA thinking is the key to success in FIFA. Football thinking is the only way to make it in football. Chelsea have not had a football mind in a position of authority in the front office in 429 days. FIFA thinking – even if they don’t know that’s what it is – is a comfortable if disastrous substitute.