Chelsea: Maurizio Sarri happily lets Pep Guardiola lead him astray

Maurizio Sarri flatters himself by talking about his admiration for and willingness to learn from Pep Guardiola. Meanwhile, Guardiola plays Sarri like a fiddle at Chelsea’s expense.

Maurizio Sarri considers himself a student of Pep Guardiola’s footballing philosophy, a delusion reinforced by his merry band of sycophants. At best, Sarri adopts the superficial characteristics of a Guardiola team – possession, one-touch passing, quick-moving triangles – divorced from the underlying philosophy. Among the abstractions that separate Sarri from Guardiola is the latter’s man-management abilities. Like Jose Mourinho, Guardiola knows how to tap into the psychological dark arts to manipulate those around him: players, media and even other coaches.

Because Guardiola knows Sarri hangs on his every word, he selects those words to produce the outcome he wants. Guardiola lavishes praise on Sarri’s football because there is nothing Guardiola would like more than to have every meeting between Chelsea and Manchester City go down like the 6-0 game earlier this month. Guardiola talks about the importance of sticking to your system in the early stages because he knows Sarri will do so and cripple Chelsea in the process. By reinforcing Sarri’s worst tendencies, Guardiola is removing Chelsea from the list of clubs he needs to worry about this season and into the future.

Knowing what we now know about Sarri and what we are imputing to Guardiola, we have to wonder the full context of Guardiola’s advice “to work only on 14 players otherwise you are in trouble. You need too much time to improve all the squad.” Sarri claims Guardiola told him this last summer, and it informed his squad management this season.

For starters, it’s just too perfect. Guardiola said 14 players, and Sarri has a clear preference for 14 players in his Premier League XI. Through the first half of the season, the Premier League XI + 3 (that is, 14) were complemented by the Europa League six. But with Victor Moses and Cesc Fabregas gone and Gary Cahill ghosted, the available minutes will concentrate even more.

What was the rest of that conversation, though? What was the context? Did Guardiola advise Sarri to do what Sarri has done, or were there other, mitigating thoughts?

Guardiola:”You’ll only really have time to train 14 players, but you have several world-class players who won’t need much.”

Sarri: “14 players, got it.”

Guardiola: “Right, that’s on top of guys like Eden Hazard, Cesc Fabregas and N’Golo Kante.”

Sarri: “Yep, train exactly 14 players.” (angrily rummages his pockets for a Pall Mall)

Guardiola: “Not quite. I can think of 4-5 Chelsea players who will pick it up right away. They probably already know it.”

Sarri: “I heard you, 14, do you have a light?”

Few of Guardiola’s words to Sarri reflect his own actions at Manchester City. Contrary to popular vapidity, Guardiola constantly adapted his tactics, formations and lineups through his first two seasons. He rigidly adhered to his philosophy, but nothing downstream of that. Guardiola was always finding the best solutions for the players he had (tailoring a suit, some might say) en route to getting the best players he wanted.

Guardiola may have focused his efforts on 14 players. But in his first season he had 22 players with over 500 Premier League minutes. Last season he whittled them down to 18, but already this season – through 27 matches – he already has 19 players with over 500.

Maurizio Sarri never had more than 16 players with over 500 minutes in Serie A. He is on track for 16 Chelsea players to cross that mark, and that accounts for the Alvaro Morata – Gonzalo Higuain swap.

Perhaps he didn’t need Pep Guardiola’s advice after all.

Finally, Pep Guardiola runs a ruthlessly competitive squad. David Luiz, Willian and several other players cannot put in a sufficiently craptacular performance to bring a replacement off the bench into the starting XI. Neither the 4-0 loss to Bournemouth nor the 6-0 loss to Manchester City nor the series of desultory one-goal wins through the festive period saw any player lose his place on Sarri’s team sheet.

Pep Guardiola has told his players that if they do not put forth their full efforts this weekend in the FA Cup against League Two’s Newport County AFC, they will not play in the Carabao Cup final or Champions League Round of 16. His best players’ opportunity to play in a final or in Europe is contingent on their motivation against a team 82 places below.

This is the mentality that produces 9-0 wins against Burton Albion and 6-0 wins against Chelsea. The lack of this mentality from the coach to the players produces 6-0 losses against Manchester City.

Maurizio Sarri may think he is following in Pep Guardiola’s footsteps, but he is merely being led to where Guardiola wants him to go: out of the top six. The only risk for Guardiola is that he will be too successful and Sarri will get the sack before the start of next season.

No wonder Guardiola’s enjoying the good times while he can. The next coach will certainly be less pliable, and will arrive sooner than he planned.