Maresca's Relentless Team Changes Has Chelsea Reeling.
Although The Blues didn’t completely torpedo their prospects of ending up in the highest eight places of the Bigger Cup group stage, they performed a precise, surgical strike on their own hopes of strolling directly into the round of 16. Of course, the silver lining is that in the brief history of the recently revamped competition, securing a top-eight finish may not be as crucial as it seems.
The Central Issue: A Monotonous Lack of Consistency
Sadly for Stamford Bridge regulars, the only consistent thing about the Chelsea team is a monotonously predictable inconsistency, which has been widely discussed following their loss in Italy. After apparently rubber-stamping their credentials with an commanding victory of a European giant, and then a feisty stalemate with a London rival, the team have been stuffed by Leeds, played out a snoozy stalemate at the south coast club and have now lost against a average team from Serie A.
Although pundits have been quick to lay the blame on a team selection approach that seems to see Enzo Maresca change his lineup like a kebab shop’s elephant leg of doner meat, the manager insists that, knack and naughty step permitting, the core of his starting lineup for games against strong opposition is mostly fixed.
“In my view in that game, starting team, we had on the field eight, nine players that play against Spurs, they play against Barca, they play against Wolverhampton, Arsenal,” he stated. “There were eight, nine players that are the ones playing every time for matches of this magnitude. So if you see the five changes that we did from the Bournemouth game, it’s a different situation.”
The Path Forward
For a genuine opportunity of avoiding the additional knockout round, Chelsea will have to be victorious in their remaining two matches. In the first, they welcome the unexpected contenders a Cypriot team, then travel back to the continent to face the Serie A champions, the Neapolitan side.
“Victories in both are required, if not, we will face the playoff and then progress to the following stage,” sniffed Maresca, whose following fixture is a game against an Merseyside team whose current form has taken to them to the surprising position of the top half in the Premier League.
Side Stories
Quote of the Day: “It's interesting, it’s actually funny because his biggest dream was me becoming a professional golfer. That was his ultimate ambition. So when I was 10, he forced me to start on golf. So I practiced every week from when I was 10 to 13” – Erling Haaland revealed how, if his father had his preference, he could have been teeing off rather than tearing it up in the Premier League.
Readers' Letters
“So, no wonder Wolves are in such a poor situation. As any longtime reader of this email will know, the only effective pre-match protests involve walking from a pub that the supporters planned to be at anyway, to the ground that they were inevitably going to. Just arriving 10 minutes late? That’s how long it takes fans to get to their seats anyway” – one reader.
“I see that a reader not only got Tuesday’s letter o’ the day, but also a mention in a separate letter. On a night where both clubs from Sheffield again surrendered points after leading, I am wondering: could the city be proving that the frequency of representation in your mailbag is inversely proportional to the value of anything our teams are accomplishing on the field?” – another fan.