Chelsea sponsored a family reunion of sorts by bringing in Gonzalo Higuain on loan. Now they have to hope they are not one of those reclusive, codependent families who don’t get along with others.
Perhaps there’s a dark underside to Maurizio Sarri’s “fun.” No, we don’t mean the interminable suffering of tippy-tappy keep-ball with no end product in a well-defined “U” that never intersects the opponent’s box. We’re talking about Sarri’s tough-love, whether it is slamming Chelsea players in post-game press-conferences or calling his “football son” Gonzalo Higuain a “s***head.”
Sarri’s scatological description was a bit over the top, not so much for the obscenity but for coming in the context of his expectation for Higuain to win the Ballon d’Or. We’ll fault and criticize Higuain for a lot, but not even my colleague Hugo Amaya would go in studs-up on Higuain for not winning football’s highest individual honour. We might as well slate Higuain for not developing a new flu vaccine and mediating peace treaties in his spare time.
More realistic and relevant to Chelsea are Sarri’s comments to The Telegraph about Higuain as a player. Sarri’s description of Higuain should jar Chelsea fans for their similarity to whatever many people said in a much harsher tone of voice about Higuain’s predecessor.
"He needs confidence first of all. He needs a very good relationship with the coach, with the team-mates. Sometimes he needs a message from the coach in the press conference. We will see in the future. – The Telegraph"
So… a No. 9 for whom confidence is a make-or-break element of his play, is needy around the locker room and hangs on every word coming from the pre- and post-game podium. And here we thought Chelsea loaned that guy to Atletico Madrid.
One frequently overlooked footnote to the entire Alvaro Morata saga is how much he looked at Antonio Conte the way Higuain looks at Sarri.
"Conte is the manager who most ‘bet’ on me, without even ever having had me in his team. I’m very conscious of that: he bet on me for Juventus but left before I arrived; then he wanted me at Chelsea come what may. He knows me better than I could imagine, I’m sure, and that’s important: it motivates you to work hard, train well. I feel indebted to him because he’s the coach that most trusted in me, most wanted me, who made me feel I could perform at the highest level. – The Guardian"
It’s almost heart-breaking to read this (along with the rest of The Guardian’s fantastic and oddly deep coverage of Alvaro Morata) knowing what happened to both men, their relationship and the club in the subsequent year.
Sarri and Higuain have a very obvious and crucial point of differentiation from Conte and Morata: they actually worked together before coming to Chelsea. Conte “bet” on Morata at Chelsea just as he did at Juventus. There are plenty of elements left to chance with Higuain and Sarri at Stamford Bridge, but they can at least point to one season and 36 goals together to justify the board’s decision.
Chelsea have to hope their current striker-coach dyad continues to diverge from the predecessor. Higuain scored a brace in his third game as a Blue, but those count for little besides checking the box, coming as they did against Huddersfield. His ability to recreate his 2015/16 form over the rest of February will be a better indicator of whether the bet will pay off.
The longer term aspect of the bet on Higuain is what will happen if he outlasts Sarri at Stamford Bridge. If he is so dependent on the confidence instilled by this one specific coach, how much value will he have for Chelsea when that coach leaves?
Maurizio Sarri’s defenders talk about how Pep Guardiola and Jurgen Klopp were given both time and transfers by their respective clubs to get those clubs to where they are today. The idea of buying players for the manager is picking up more traction, likely as both coaches and fans realize it shifts the burden off of them to say they did not have the right personnel.
The danger, though, is when the players are specific to that coach. Players and coaches can have a rapport that extends to other situations and even off the pitch. But their success together is usually inextricable from the broader context: team, league, age, tactics, club and the rest.
The risks increase at a club like Chelsea, where all coaches are short-term. If they establish the precedent of buying Sarri-specific players, they will be at a grave disadvantage when the next coach comes in and finds players who offer little to other coaches. The best players are, to some extent, coach agnostic. They may prefer one man or one style more than the other, but they are roundly the same in a variety of settings. Chelsea now have two players about whom that cannot be said.
Gonzalo Higuain and Maurizio Sarri seem quite happy with their reunion, and if that leads to goals, wins, cups and Champions League qualification, the short-term bet paid off. And it would pay better returns than the Antonio Conte – Alvaro Morata (re)union, even if it leaves open the question of whether Higuain improved on what Morata could have done at Chelsea.
However, it’s always the long-term that bites Chelsea, even if they manage to cover up long-term deficiencies with the latest in-the-moment success.