Chelsea’s most under-appreciated: 4 players, 2 managers and the good doctor

3. Dr. Eva Carneiro: We should have trusted her – she’s a doctor (George Perry)

Injuries are a part of football, just as they are a part of every sport. Some teams suffer more injuries than others, and sometimes the causes are rather obvious: more demanding style of play, more games in a season, smaller squad, mismanagement.

But just as how tactics don’t just happen – there’s a manager back there teaching and coordinating the players – injuries don’t just happen, or more specifically, they don’t just not happen. When a team regularly has very few injuries, someone is responsible for that: several someone’s, usually. And when a team experiences a sudden spike in injuries, perhaps a spike that lasts so long it becomes a plateau and then – worse yet – the accepted norm, it’s often because one of those someone’s left.

Chelsea have become accustomed to never having a fully healthy squad and always having at least one player who would otherwise be a regular in the first team out with a long-term injury. The turning point towards what should be an unacceptable baseline was August 9, 2015.

Jose Mourinho hit one of his personal and professional nadirs when Chelsea’s team doctor, Dr. Eva Carneiro ran onto the pitch to treat Eden Hazard in the season opener against Swansea City. Mourinho explained after the game that Hazard was not really hurt, but was simply tired late in the game; and that by going onto the pitch to treat him, Carneiro forced Hazard temporarily out of action as the already 10-man Blues were defending a set piece. He expects his medical staff to think tactically first, then medically, Hippocrates be damned.

But Mourinho justified himself after he shouted an unprintable and unacceptable insult towards Carneiro, and slightly before he demoted her from her position tending to the first team.

A few years and another lost lawsuit later, Chelsea have dealt with one injury after another, with the manager usually having a slightly different list of injured players to open each press conference.

Most concerning are the players with injuries that have moved beyond “long term” into the realm of chronic, or who have experienced the daisy chain of injuries that comes from a kinetic chain still reeling from the initial insult.

Ruben Loftus-Cheek, the player who best exemplifies a lifetime at Chelsea Football Club, also exemplifies that trend. Just as players and teams need continuity in style of play and management to be at their best, they need continuity along with quality in medical care, rehabilitation and athletic performance training.

The kind the Blues had from 2011*-2015 at the highest level, but have never replaced.

*Andre Villas-Boas brought Dr. Carneiro into the first team – another reason to appreciate him more.