As Chelsea look to continue their progress in the Europa League, Maurizio Sarri is edging ever closer to the Blues’ managerial has-been pile. An uninspiring few weeks has seen “our football” found out by other teams, dismantled and lobbed into the nearest skip.
Maurizio Sarri’s persistent belief that his methods will eventually yield success appears – to the uninitiated – fanciful to say the least. Those calling for Sarri to go are looked down upon by those who purport to understand the system and “trust the process.”
Chelsea have never been about systems or processes, though. Neither are they a project. Chelsea Football Club are about swagger and style. Chelsea Football Club are carefree wherever they may be. “Our football” is not about “suffering without the ball.”
In the long term, Sarri’s methodology may well come to fruition, but it’s not the Chelsea way. Whilst the players are taking a fair degree of flak and being accused of not being up to the job, let’s not forget they won the Premier League just two seasons ago.
Sarri may well have lost the dressing room but I don’t see the players giving up on those that really matter – the fans. I see players fed up and bamboozled by a system they don’t believe in. Didn’t Manchester United players “give up” under Jose Mourinho a few short weeks ago? How quickly that’s been forgotten now Ole Gunnar Solskjaer is in charge.
United, as we saw on Monday, are on the up. That their players couldn’t perform earlier in the season was very much because of Mourinho. Well, at least that’s what the media and pundits would like us to believe.
But wait. In reality, Jose is Chelsea, so that’s OK, that suits the well-worn narrative. Using that warped logic, Chelsea’s players must be rotten to the core, it’s not the manager’s fault, he’s not Chelsea.
With a big dollop of hindsight, the fault lies in Sarri’s appointment. It’s unfair to call the players out and the Italian is simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. So desperate were the board to rid themselves of Antonio Conte that they brought Sarri in without too much thought. They should have looked at his background a bit more closely. The money bods behind the scenes saw his finance background and thought they’d found someone to share their now- frugal beliefs. His footballing managerial record and methods (no rotation, no use of youth players) indicate a man not fit for purpose.
Those fans demanding more effort from the current starting XI and berating them when they don’t give it are keen to see Chelsea’s youth players given an opportunity. In a way, Sarri’s the same. He claims he can’t motivate the players but still plays them. It might well be “right on” to say it’s OK for N’golo Kante to played out of position – it isn’t and he is – but I don’t trust the process. I certainly don’t trust the manager anymore.
Moving forward it’s almost inevitable that Maurizio Sarri won’t see the season out at Chelsea. He may not see the month or even week out and I’m afraid that when he goes, it will all be on him. Aside from his ridiculous appointment – and I did back him at the start – his stubborn devotion to a system that is unworkable with the players he has will be his undoing and rightly so.
The predictable like-for-like substitutions have made him and the club a laughing stock. Not playing “kids” that at are clearly more than capable has done the same. Continually playing with a back four when you don’t have a decent left-back is embarrassing. Replacing Cesar Azplilicueta with Davide Zappacosta in the final minutes of a cup tie you are losing 2-0 simply beggars belief. I’m sorry, Mr Sarri, but your work here is done.
Regardless of who comes in next, they’ll get my full support. But please, please, please, work with the tools you are given. You cannot drive a nail home with a spanner.