Chelsea: Jorginho, Kovacic resembling the greats, and other lessons learned
By Nate Hofmann
2. VAR is just the worst
Chelsea had fortunately avoided any meaningful run-ins with the much-maligned VAR so far this season, apart from the rightly disallowed goal against Liverpool and a couple of unimportant decisions. On Saturday however, Chelsea were bitten by the two-headed snake of VAR and Mike Dean, who conspired to award a ludicrous penalty that set up a stressful final ten minutes.
Apart from Dean, who loves to bring attention to himself to a degree only Mark Clattenburg can empathize with, no one in their right mind thought Jorginho’s challenge on Gerard Deulofeu merited a penalty. Not even Anthony Taylor.
VAR has been an especially well-beaten horse this season, and often with good reason. Even those who are generally in favor of it are conceding that its implementation in the Premier League has been frustrating at best. I quite enjoy it when it results in misery for the likes of Arsenal and Tottenham, but it’s just not the same when it’s Chelsea receiving the short end of the stick.
we called it. Chelsea fans will have buyers' remorse when VAR hits the the Premier League. light
Fortunately, this particular incident didn’t end up costing Chelsea points. Looking at the bigger picture, it’s good for Chelsea to suffer a botched VAR-ing, considering it’s becoming an unfortunate staple of the Premier League. Young teams have the tendency to be psychologically fragile, so it wouldn’t have been all that surprising to see Chelsea concede a second goal as a result of the frustration from the penalty decision. Admittedly, they very well could have done so at the last second, had Kepa Arrizabalaga failed to keep out Ben Foster’s(!) header.
Thankfully, Arrizabalaga did manage to claw it away, and the celebrations after the match showed that the victory held more meaning than just picking up the three points.
Chelsea overcoming the forces that be (read: Mike Dean and VAR) shows that this young team is developing into a cohesive group of bona fide professionals. That’s a testament to Frank Lampard’s management and the character of the players in the squad, both young and old.