Chelsea and Frank Lampard succeed when they suffer against top six

Chelsea’s Frank Lampard has had some interesting tactical victories (and occasionally actual ones) against the top six when the Blues are made to suffer.

One of Antonio Conte’s most famous phrases was about the club being “prepared to suffer”. It became a bit of a rallying cry and a battering ram for and against him both during his tenure and during Maurizio Sarri’s. Now anytime any Chelsea manager merely uses the world “suffer”, the fans mimic Conte’s famous words.

Interestingly enough, Lampard’s Chelsea side seems to perform at its best when it is made to suffer a bit. The Blues may not have won every single match they have suffered in this season, but they have won on the tactical side of things more often than not.

This is similar to a trend seen under Jose Mourinho in his second stint all the way to now. When playing teams the Blues should be beating comfortably, they struggle to break the “weaker” side down. If the game is won, it is won as tightly and scrappy as possible.

On the same note, when Chelsea is forced into that role, they seem to wake up and revive that old guard fight. It happened frequently under Mourinho and Conte and is continuing now under Lampard. Again, they are not all wins, but the Blues are turning up and controlling the game by letting some control go the other way.

Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s control over Chelsea is a great example. When Manchester United has played Lampard’s Blues, they have shelled up and countered. They invited Chelsea on to them in ways not dissimilar to Bournemouth or Newcastle, but United possessed the quality to make the counters truly dangerous.

On the other end is Jurgen Klopp who rarely sees his side take the back foot (this is in of itself a lesson Klopp uses to get the better on Pep Guardiola). Lampard has faced Klopp three times and only won once, but every single one of those games the Blues were the stronger side by letting Liverpool have more control.

This is all a concept that frequently came up last season with Sarri. Space is one of the biggest, if not the biggest, variables of the game. Some teams control space by movement, but that is not the only way to control space. When Chelsea sits off their opponent, they are simply creating more space vertically to spring into. Mourinho has long used this very notion and Lampard at least seems to be familiar with the concept as well.

Of course, Mourinho against Lampard is kind of the outlier in this situation. Chelsea has had the forward control over Tottenham in both matches under Mourinho which seems to buck this trend. The main difference is that in both, Lampard has utilized the 3-4-3 to control the horizontal space rather than the vertical against his old manager.

This type of adjustment against more difficult opponents is what was cried out for often under Sarri. It happened, at most, once or twice all of the Italian’s tenure. Lampard is utilizing it much more frequently and while it is not always resulting in a win, it is getting the Blues to a position where they are capable of crossing the finish line as victors.