It is already clear some don’t have the stomach for Chelsea’s rebuild

Chelsea lost their second match of the season against the reigning champions. Apparently that means doom and reality is an inconvenient narrative.

Virtually every article found on Pride of London is written in the third person. First person isn’t needed because it is already clear that it is an opinion of the writer. Second person is just a bit tacky and it simply comes off as more professional to use third in those circumstances.

This won’t be one of those articles. The vast majority of the fanbase is sensible and knows to take things like variables and unique circumstances into consideration. Then there is the other section of the fanbase. I have personally called them boo boys more often than not because they go out of their way to find the negative. But now they are basically the Frank Lampard Out Brigade and that is simply an idea divorced from reality.

It isn’t even a new idea really. This has gone back at least since Antonio Conte’s second season. He wins the title on the trot and suddenly half the fan base turns on him. A smaller section watched a lot of YouTube and begged for Maurizio Sarri even though it was clearly a terrible idea. That played out as true over the course of the season but the cult formed to deny all reality. Part of the current circumstance is likely born out from that.

The smaller notion here is that some in the fan base simply do not have the stomach to support the current rebuild the club has needed since arguably 2015 if not longer. The bigger notion is they were never going to support Frank Lampard, his tactics, his team, his transfers, or anything associated with him after the Sarri fallout. The majority of fans do not even fall into this spectrum because they’ve considered the entirety of the circumstances. But to have anyone be Lampard out now is quite simply ridiculous and it is a narrative has already begun to seep into the sensible part of the fanbase.

So let’s break this down as much as possible, step by step. Lampard is obviously a young manager, but a year with the Championship and a year with the most broken team in Chelsea’s recent history shows plenty of signs of promise. Derby County fell apart after Lampard left and it is hard to argue that the youth revolution would have happened at all without a manager like Lampard. That is not to say it is perfect or that he does not still have much to learn, but overall it has worked out.

Then we approach match day two of this season against the reigning champions Liverpool. Did anyone really expect a win? Very few if any. So why was there so much Chicken Littling going on after the match?

The most common argument seems to be tactical or lineup related. Lampard supposedly got his tactics wrong by playing defensive against the, hold on let me check my notes, reigning champions of England with a half injured squad on no preseason with tons of new players. And you know what? Those tactics were working absolutely fine until the red card.

Defense was a massive issue for Chelsea all of last season. It has clearly been something Lampard has been keen to address. Between these two matches, the signs of that are bearing out. Chelsea is playing more compactly and deeper on the pitch than previously. I mentioned last week that possession does not equal control over a match and the Blues arguably had control over Liverpool in the first half. No, they did not create much, but neither did Liverpool.

Even with the red card, Lampard isn’t wrong in saying that it could have ended level if not for Kepa Arrizabalaga’s mistake. Assuming all else stays the same (which, is already a bit pie in the sky), Chelsea gets the penalty at 1-0 instead of 2-0. Maybe that makes the difference for Jorginho.

The lineup also seems to have caused much hand wringing, as it often does when it picks itself. Arrizabalaga had to start if the club wants to have a pretense of a fair competition between Edouard Mendy whenever he signs. Willy Caballero starting immediately blows that pretense away before it even begins.

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The centerback pair did just fine against Brighton and deserved to start with one another again. They actually did fantastically before Andreas Christensen lost his head and got red. But even that should not undo that he was arguably the best defender beforehand. Few are calling for Antonio Rudiger to start and it was clear Thiago Silva wasn’t ready. Fikayo Tomori came on and did well, putting his name back in contention, but Chelsea may find it hard to offer him the game time he needs.

Reece James starts on form. Ben Chilwell is not yet ready and Cesar Azpilicueta apparently isn’t either or else he surely would have started. That leaves Marcos Alonso, a favorite of the boo boys because they love to pretend he has never had a good match in his career. It is like they are programmed to say “it looks like nothing to me”.

The remaining six are so intertwined but it often comes down to Callum Hudson-Odoi and Olivier Giroud. Hudson-Odoi is a strange one because so many love to blast him every time he plays as a flop, yet when he isn’t playing he is seemingly the answer to all the problems. Giroud ended last season well, but his inclusion means someone else has to drop because it surely wouldn’t have been Timo Werner.

Of course, this is where the whole idea of Mason Mount and Jorginho being avatars of “their” managers comes into play. Mount plays on the wing because he puts in the dirty work that the others simply won’t. No one can claim Mount doesn’t play harder than almost anyone on the pitch either. That stuff matters for a team’s overall balance.

Jorginho is a trickier one but the midfield three of Mateo Kovacic, Jorginho, and N’Golo Kante is Chelsea’s most conservative and seemingly Lampard’s go to (for now) against teams like Liverpool that he absolutely should be conservative against. Is he a defensive liability? Yes. But his inclusion at least lets Kovacic and Kante play wider which pushes the opponent to the flanks more often. Had Chelsea played with Mount, Ross Barkley, or Kai Havertz as a 10, then the pivot of Kante and Kovacic would have been blasted for much of the game.

Speaking of Kai Havertz, some are already calling him a flop while others are crying about Lampard playing him out of position despite how many times it has been said he can play anywhere in the attacking line. Before begin subbed off to solidify the group of 10, he did well giving Timo Werner the space to work. But like Mount, giving someone else the space doesn’t make for a sexy highlight reel that many of their critics watch in lieu of the match.

Finally there is the whole section of fans that say Chelsea can’t be playing like this after spending so much money in the window. That’s a funny one. Mendy hasn’t signed yet. Silva, Chilwell, and Hakim Ziyech aren’t fit. Havertz only just joined a short time ago and is clearly not up to full match fitness. Only Werner is firing on all cylinders but give it one more scoreless game and the boo boys will be calling him the next Alvaro Morata. Apparently Lampard is supposed to be top of the table because he spent all this money even though he hasn’t been able to use any of the players he spent money on.

I know that was long but that is often how long it takes to untangle this web of narrative and insanity set up by the boo boys. I’ve no idea if anyone will actually read this article in its entirety but it is a message that needs to be sent out all the same.

It is just past match day two in the second season of a young manager in charge of the club. Liverpool and Manchester City have made the gap to the rest massive and neither Jurgen Klopp nor Pep Guardiola were able to get their teams clicking in just one season. It took Klopp a half decade before he even started seeing silverware. If the argument is Liverpool started at a different place than Chelsea, it may be right, but the gap to the top is little different.

Chelsea isn’t Jose Mourinho’s Chelsea anymore. It isn’t Carlo Ancelotti’s or Antonio Conte’s or even Maurizio Sarri’s. It is Frank Lampard’s. The expectations for a club like Chelsea are to compete. But losing on match day two to the best team in England when most expected it, using a lineup that picked itself, without most of the new signings? It has shown who has the stomach for this rebuild and who is better served booting FIFA back up and returning to their clean, YouTube highlight reel fantasy land.