Chelsea: Injuries build the story of Hudson-Odoi and Barkley vs. Forest

Injuries have been major factors for Ross Barkley and Callum Hudson-Odoi this season. Where they are in their recovery adds the context to their performances in Chelsea’s FA Cup win over Nottingham Forest.

Before Chelsea fans could put their hands over their mouths in the universal gesture of “Oh, no, oh please god no,” the physio staff were sprinting onto the pitch where Callum Hudson-Odoi was sitting down, holding his once-torn right Achilles. The physios applied some ice and did some assisted range-of-motion work, and within a few minutes Hudson-Odoi was back in the action without showing any sign of pain, re-injury or cause for concern.

Hudson-Odoi’s Achilles is never far from his mind. After the game, he said he often thinks about “If I get kicked on it like today what could happen…If I do a certain movement it will go again.”

Other than that short spell where he received treatment, Hudson-Odoi did not show many residual effects of his injury.

Ross Barkley, on the other hand, looked far less than 100%, although it was only a full day after the game before anyone in the Barkley or Blues camps provided any information about it.

Barkley revealed he had “fine chips on two parts of bone in my foot,” and the pain from these chips made it impossible for him to kick the ball with his right foot. So he trained “one-footed,” doing almost everything with his left foot when he was able to train at all. This very much explains why so many of his passes, even very short ones, were off-target (he had the lowest pass completion percentage of any Chelsea starter – any site out there break down accuracy by foot?), and why he often tried what appeared to be needless passes with the outside of his foot.

He wasn’t just lacking match sharpness in the global sense. His dominant foot was physiologically un-sharp.

Callum Hudson-Odoi and Ross Barkley were at opposite ends of the performance scale against Nottingham Forest, despite each earning one appearance on the score sheet. The context of their respective injuries moves both of their performances up the grade curve: it makes Hudson-Odoi’s even more impressive, and softens the criticism of Barkley’s.

The stories of their injuries came out the morning after the came, and speak to one of the tensions between management and the public, as mediated by, well, the media.

A manager will not want to give too much information about his players’ physical conditions before a game.

For starters, he will want there to be a certain amount of uncertainty about his lineup and formation until the teamsheet is released an hour before kick-off. If he gives too much information away during the week, it can help the opponent prepare their game plan. This is especially the case in a game where everyone expects a large amount of rotation, such as a cup tie against lower-tier opposition.

Second, the manager will not want to give his opponent a list of vulnerabilities that they can target. If they know that one player has been able to do much with his right foot in training, they will do what they can to take away shooting and passing lanes with his left, showing him on to his weaker foot. Some of the more craven and cynical players may even put a bull’s eye on the injured body part, knowing that a strong but legal or borderline tackle could be take the player out of the game.

On the other hand, managing the expectations and public pressures on his players is a part of the manager’s job. It always has been, even if it has become more acute in the era of social media.

Fans and pundits – even the most educated and sympathetic among them – are limited by what they know. If the only thing they have to go on is the performance they see on the screen, then a poor performance is just that: a poor performance, when in reality it was a decent performance, all things considered, and, more importantly, one that is both readily explainable and a positive basis for making future assessments now that the baseline is accurately set.

This is an application of Perry’s First Law of Sports Communications (although it clearly applies in all professions, this is the one I know): Be as open as possible when things are good so people have more than results to hold on to when things are bad.

Ross Barkley training with one foot would have been a great and sympathetic narrative over the last few months. It would have shown the lengths he was going to in his desire to earn his way back into the side, especially at a time when the only news people were getting about his activities were his parties in Dubai. It could have made for some clever social media. And it would have made his return to the starting XI look like a real achievement, a significant milestone toward which he has worked for several months, one around which Chelsea fans could rally. They could have been cheering on every touch with his right foot knowing that it may have caused him to wince a bit, but he was willing to do that because Ross the Boss is True Blue.

Instead, it came across as the last chance saloon / shop window for a loan, and his performance was set in that negative context.

Part of this comes down to Chelsea, and whatever their decision-making process and teams are amongst the players, manager, communications and media staff. Another part of it, though, comes down to the credentialed media.

Almost every press conference starts with a question on who is injured. The manager rattles off a list of who is out, who is back in training and who will be a late fitness test.

You know what never happens after this formulaic answer? A follow-up. “What more can you tell us about Player X’s injury? Is Player Y still feeling the effects of his earlier injury? How is Player Z getting on with his field work after being cleared to do more than pool running?” Maybe, angels and ministers of grace protect us, some in the media could actually do a bit of research and learn a thing or to about injuries so they can ask informed questions and follow-ups, and start a real conversation.

Of course, that will never happen. Every question about a player’s health or welfare takes time away from questions about parties in Dubai and the latest batch of transfer rumours. Who wouldn’t rather hear a predictably and professionally non-descript non-answer about a transfer rumour?

Well, me, and probably you if you’re reading this.

Now that we really know what went into Ross Barkley’s and Callum Hudson-Odoi’s performance against Nottingham Forest, there is a different sense of expectation around their next appearance.

For Barkley, in particular, there is now a sense that their may be a next appearance for Chelsea, something that was definitely not in the air for the 24 hours after the game.

Is there anything anyone wants to tell us about Michy Batshuayi?