What should Chelsea do about Kai Havertz? Be patient and find alternatives

Chelsea’s Kai Havertz has had a rough few weeks. The solution to that problem is to be patient with him and not be too quick to run a star away.

Patients might be one of the hardest things in football. Especially for a club like Chelsea with games often coming three or four days apart, there is no time to sit and wait. This season even more so with the packed schedule. But at the same time, no judgement should ever be made off a sample size of one season.

It should be a familiar story for Chelsea fans. Alvaro Morata comes in, scores a ton, gets hurt, is rushed back, does poorly, is shoved out the door. Tiemoue Bakayoko too. Kevin De Bruyne, Mohamed Salah, and Romelu Lukaku can also tell similar tales. It is too easy for the club and fans alike to assume things are always going to be one way without making the decisions along the way to change things.

Kai Havertz is the latest. He is only 21, a baby in professional terms regardless of the experience under his belt. He is new to the country which of course will affect him. But perhaps most importantly at the moment is he is very clearly recovering from this thing called Covid. Maybe you’ve heard of it. He had it bad but criticism of him ignores that.

There is even a more recent notion that 4-3-3 doesn’t suit him for some reason. Supposedly he is a 10 that, despite playing as an eight, nine, and wide forward at Bayer Leverkusen, cannot do the same at Chelsea. But that is a symptom of the real problem which is the aforementioned Covid.

Havertz was just coming into his own when he caught the virus. Some people get it without a symptom. Some have minor ones. Others, like Havertz, spend most of the time struggling to breathe. That’s one side of the issue. The other is the confusion which may or may not be associated. Ever run a long distance and then try to do math or make decisions? It is harder for most. Now take Covid, and plop a player into one of the hardest leagues in the world and ask him to help orchestrate. It is difficult to impossible. But that is the Havertz that is getting reviewed and deemed a flop now.

Mind, a lot of this could be solved by not playing him. He clearly isn’t match fit and needs more time to recover from all the effects of Covid. But like Morata or Bakayoko with their injuries, Havertz isn’t being afforded time to heal. That should be considered when viewing him but few that criticize him mention his Covid. They simply see a player that isn’t doing good enough and assume that is how it always will be.

The answer of what to do with Havertz is be patient first of all and rest him second of all. He shouldn’t be starting yet. In fact, he probably should only be coming off the bench (if even that) until the FA Cup fixture. That and other similar games in January can provide him the right platform to recover.

But the current one of having to be the main creator with Hakim Ziyech out? It isn’t going to happen. It does him a disserve, just as much as dismissing his struggles with Covid does. Let him rest, recover, and regroup to go again in the second half of the season.