Pressure on Chelsea manager Mauricio Pochettino. Has he been unlucky with results, or is his plan for the team simply unworkable? FourFourTwo's Adam Clery examines English football's biggest conundrum.
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00:00 *intro*
00:03 Hello everybody, Adam Cleary, 442 here and Chelsea, what the hell-see.
00:09 Yeah, they've just done it again, haven't they?
00:11 They've posted a corner-turning win against Brighton, followed up by a very weird evening against Manchester United,
00:16 and have now just been done by Everton.
00:19 And this has, of course, been the pattern for their season so far, so we must ask the question in today's video,
00:24 just, why is this team not good?
00:28 *ding*
00:30 Alright, so, okay, this is the XI that started against Everton.
00:34 I think anybody looking at this would say, "That's actually a pretty good team!"
00:38 You've got solidity and intelligence at the back, and Rhys James, who's really, really good.
00:42 You've got two of the most expensive central midfielders ever, and up front,
00:46 you've got, like, a mix of experience and potential and work rate, and just, there's a lot, there's a lot good about this team.
00:54 But they went to Goodison Park, and they had more of the ball, they had more attempts on goal,
00:58 they controlled large parts of the match, and still, for a seventh time this season, got beat.
01:04 Well, if we go right back to the very start of the season, I think the consensus about Chelsea was that,
01:09 yes, the results had been poor, but the performances were actually quite good.
01:13 We even did a video on the channel looking at the underlying numbers from those early performances,
01:18 and the signs were very encouraging.
01:20 You can even see here, in this graph, that I have hastily and sloppily cobbled together.
01:24 If you're somebody who believes you can tell anything from the XG,
01:27 Chelsea were regularly, every single week, outscoring their opponent on XG,
01:32 and the highlights would always include really bad misses, usually from Nicholas Jackson, but could be absolutely anybody.
01:37 So the narrative was clear. They are playing well, they're having a lot of the ball,
01:41 their possession stats will put them on, they're excellent as well, they're just not taking their chances.
01:46 Now that is all still true, to an extent. If you look at the Everton game, they had loads of possession,
01:51 they had more attempts on goal, they had more attempts on target.
01:54 XG, if you're bothered, that was higher yet again, but if you watch that game,
01:58 you will just know that they never once looked in any danger of actually winning that.
02:04 And that is because those stats, in particular the whole XG and attempts stat, is now becoming quite misleading.
02:11 I'll just, I'll show you what I mean, right?
02:13 So touches on the ball, right, that's a fairly easy thing to understand.
02:16 It's passes that are completed, it's you running with it, it's how much control you have of the football.
02:21 In the defensive third of the pitch, Chelsea rank top in the entire Premier League for the amount of touches they have had this season.
02:29 And that means that they are as comfortable and as confident and as well drilled at just knocking the ball around the back
02:34 and retaining possession as teams like Brighton or Tottenham,
02:37 two sides whose entire system is based around control in that area of the pitch.
02:41 Now, if we move it forward to the middle third of the pitch, the total number of touches,
02:45 there is a drop-off, yes, but only to fifth position.
02:48 So in terms of how comfortable they are moving the ball up the pitch into the middle third,
02:52 they are the equals of Arsenal at doing that.
02:55 All right, so let's move it up to the attacking third now, the business end of the pitch,
02:59 where all the magic has to happen, and there is a drop-off, but only one position to sixth.
03:04 In terms of retaining the ball, of passing the ball, of carrying the ball in your opponent's third,
03:09 the hardest place to do that, they are better than Brighton and better than Newcastle.
03:14 They do it almost as much as Liverpool do.
03:17 But let's do one more stat.
03:20 A key pass, OK, it's a really easy one to understand, it is any pass of the ball that leads directly to a shot.
03:26 On this one, Chelsea drop from first, fifth and sixth to 13.
03:31 They go from posting the same kind of numbers as Brighton, as Arsenal and as Liverpool,
03:36 to posting the same sort of numbers as Bournemouth and Crystal Palace and Brentford.
03:41 So what does that information actually tell us though?
03:43 Well, to put it really simply, it tells us that in terms of holding on to the ball,
03:46 to passing the ball, carrying the ball, building out from the back, moving up through the pitch,
03:50 90% of the game of football, Chelsea are really, really good.
03:55 But when it comes to turning that dominance, that possession, that ball control into threat,
04:01 into chances, the last 10%, the hardest 10%, they are exactly where they should be in the Premier League.
04:07 They are in lower mid-table.
04:09 But again, why is that?
04:11 Well, if there should have been one immediate takeaway from the Everton game,
04:14 it's that this does not look like a team that knows exactly what it's supposed to be doing in the final third.
04:21 Pochettino seems to have finally settled on this 4-2-3-1,
04:25 except it's not even really a 4-2-3-1 because Gallagher and Fernandes are both so all over the place
04:30 and covering so much ground, it's kind of like a very weird, conservative 4-3-3.
04:35 If I could just show you what I mean here, this is their pass map from the Everton game,
04:39 which shows you the average position they were making their passes from.
04:42 First of all, ignore Kukerea here. He wasn't playing in the middle.
04:46 He just played obviously the first half on one side, the first half on the other.
04:48 So his average is going to be in the middle. Just look at Gallagher and Fernandes.
04:52 Given that Gallagher here is supposed to be in a deep double pivot with Caicedo
04:56 and Fernandes is supposed to be at number 10 floating around the centre forward,
05:00 it's just not how that looks at all.
05:02 If we look at their individual pass maps, you can just see why this doesn't work at all.
05:06 Like this is Conor Gallagher, your nominal sitting midfield player,
05:10 who is absolutely everywhere across the course of a game.
05:14 And this is Enzo Fernandes, your creative attacking number 10,
05:17 who constantly drifts over to the left-hand side.
05:20 And just what should be leaping off this page at you as a Chelsea fan
05:24 is how few of these arrows point forward.
05:27 He so rarely is able to make an attacking pass in the final third.
05:32 In fact, honestly, if you just really squint at this, I think there's one like around here,
05:36 which is sort of the only ball that goes directly forward into a dangerous area.
05:42 Do you see what I mean with those numbers before?
05:44 How they're really good at the back and really good in the middle
05:46 and actually really good at retaining the ball here.
05:48 But when it comes to just getting the killer pass, opening a team up,
05:52 they just really struggle to do it.
05:54 So problem number one, Enzo Fernandes, your number 10,
05:57 is brilliant at playing football, but is not really making any chances for you.
06:01 In fact, let's get rid of all these passes and just replace it
06:04 with the chances he created in that game.
06:06 [crickets chirping]
06:09 Oh, all right, OK, we'll move on. Let's get back to Conor Gallagher,
06:12 your sitting midfielder. You'll notice he spends an awful lot of his time
06:16 on the right-hand side here. Why is that?
06:18 Well, because this is Cole Palmer's pass map, your right-hand side attacker.
06:22 You will see he drifts all the way over into the centre of the pitch,
06:25 very rarely goes down the byline, tries to play all of his game in this pocket here.
06:30 And actually, if you remember, he did that pretty effectively.
06:32 He got two really good long-range efforts off against Jordan Pickford.
06:35 They were both on target. But if we overlay all of Chelsea's shots on target
06:40 in that game, they're all just from outside the box.
06:44 They're all pretty much identical to that one from Palmer.
06:46 And if you remember as well, all the chances that were in the box,
06:49 that were a lot nearer the goal, they all missed.
06:51 They were all never likely to result in a goal.
06:54 They weren't good chances. So again, what does that tell you?
06:58 Chelsea, lot of the ball, very good on it, progressing up the pitch
07:00 really, really nicely, but get into the final third and don't know what to do.
07:05 So either they try and force a chance that's never going to go in,
07:08 or they just shoot from really far out.
07:10 And this is why, if you just rewind your brains a couple of minutes,
07:13 I said these stats about how they're playing are starting to get misleading.
07:17 Because yes, Chelsea again, do have a bigger XG than their opponents,
07:20 but it's just a cumulative score of having all these really, really poor chances.
07:26 They had 16 of them. If they all score like 0.1 or 0.2,
07:30 it's going to look like they should have had a goal,
07:33 but they were never going to get a goal.
07:34 They just do not have a clear attacking identity.
07:38 Like Fernandes, your best creator, isn't able to find a way to create anything.
07:42 Palmer, your best attacker, is coming in field to get into a dangerous area,
07:46 but then either has to do some brilliant bit of solo brilliance,
07:50 like he did against Man United, or just shoot and hope for the best.
07:54 And I mean, part of the reason he comes in field is so he can get Rhys James
07:57 up this side for his crossing and his direct running and his creativity,
08:01 and they can't get him fit. Like he hasn't finished 90 minutes once this season.
08:06 And every single week you watch Chelsea and it becomes harder and harder
08:09 to figure out what it is they're even being told to do.
08:12 Like in some games, you'll see them sit really deep and try and hit teams
08:15 on the counter with like Mudrick and Sterling, and they've created
08:18 quite a high number of chances doing that, but they've scored only like three
08:23 because they're not good chances. They're in like the top six or seven
08:27 for the number of crosses into the box this season, but they're also
08:30 rock bottom for crossing accuracy. So again, good with the build up.
08:34 They can get into those positions. They can go and do that.
08:37 But the fact that nobody can get on the end of them sort of shows
08:40 it's not really the plan. They can't create good chances that way.
08:43 And sometimes you'll see them press the opposition and push right the way up
08:47 and look like they've got the drive and the intensity to be that kind of team.
08:50 And indeed, look, they rank third in the league for the total number
08:54 of high turnovers. That can be a way to play. That can be a system.
08:58 But where do they rank for goals scored from high turnovers?
09:01 Pretty much right at the bottom again, because it's not something
09:05 they've clearly worked on. It's not the plan. It's just something they're doing.
09:10 And yes, by the way, you did just see that Man United were at the very top
09:13 and then the very bottom of that particular staff.
09:15 But we will talk about them another day. And the thing is as well,
09:18 if you go back through the fixtures and look at where the good performances were
09:21 and where their bad performances were, that paints a picture itself.
09:25 Like I thought they were brilliant against Manchester City.
09:27 They were really good against Spurs even before the sendings off.
09:30 But those are quite open games against good opponents who will let you play
09:34 and individual quality can shine through much better.
09:37 But they're more disappointing results like they couldn't score against
09:40 Nottingham Forest. They couldn't score against Bournemouth.
09:43 They couldn't score against Brentford. They couldn't score against Everton.
09:46 What do all these teams have in common? They're nice and tight and compact
09:50 and make it difficult for you. And you have to, as a team,
09:53 have ways of breaking that down. They haven't got that.
09:56 But the real, real problem here is that these results are already
09:59 and justifiably putting pressure on Mauricio Pochettino.
10:03 When you've seen the almost instant impact Emery's had at Villa,
10:07 that Postacoglou's had at Tottenham, it's not unreasonable to expect
10:10 the results to have been better. But Chelsea are in quite a unique position
10:14 compared to pretty much every other club.
10:17 They have the youngest squad in the entire Premier League.
10:20 Like the average age of their starting XI's this season
10:23 is younger than any other team. All of their transfers in the summer
10:27 by design were players under 25. And even the bulk of those
10:31 were barely above 20. And when you sign younger, less experienced players,
10:36 it normally, not always, but normally takes more time for them to settle
10:40 into new surroundings. They've got to play with new teammates,
10:43 with a new manager, in a new system. Some of them in a new league,
10:47 in a new country. There's a lot to consider here.
10:50 And if you saw that youngest average age graph before and spotted
10:53 that Arsenal were in too, you'd be like, "Aha! But Arsenal have a young team
10:56 and they're doing well." Look at how settled most of their young players are.
11:00 Bakaio Saka's like 9 or something, but he's been at Arsenal his entire career
11:04 and has 200 professional games under his belt at this point.
11:08 Like Martinelli is young as well, but he made his debut back in 2019.
11:12 They signed Saliba that same year, and yes, he's been out on loan and stuff,
11:16 but he came back with loads of experience.
11:19 But just think about it this way, okay? Declan Rice, Moises Caicedo,
11:22 the two defensive midfielders everybody was after this summer,
11:26 and they went for pretty much the same amount of money.
11:28 Declan Rice has settled instantly. Moises Caicedo looks to be having
11:31 a much harder time of it. Now I wonder why that could be.
11:34 Is it because Rice is really good and Caicedo is absolutely rubbish?
11:37 Or is it possibly that Rice has 250 games at the very top level
11:42 with West Ham under his belt, and Caicedo has played 45 times
11:46 in the Premier League for Brighton? Like, just trust me, okay?
11:49 This is honestly a good selection of players. It's not a good team yet,
11:54 but it is a good selection of players. The one thing it's lacking is experience.
11:59 Now whether that means they go out in January and they buy some older players
12:02 who can maybe slot in a bit better, allow the other ones sort of space
12:06 and the room to develop, or they just trust the process and they stick
12:10 with this squad and they just see where it ends up at the end of the season,
12:13 I don't know, but that's honestly all it's lacking.
12:17 Like, Nicholas Jackson is 22 and out of one season up front for Villarreal.
12:22 Like, he will get there as a centre forward, just not the next four games.
12:27 Anyway, that's just what I think, so let us know what you make of it all
12:29 in the comments below. I do dearly, dearly, dearly love to read them.
12:32 If you've enjoyed this video or think, "Ah, maybe there's potential there,
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12:38 at 442 on YouTube. Subscribing, I say, every video is the one thing
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12:49 In the meantime, though, you can get me on Twitter @adampeary,
12:51 C-L-E-O-I, 442 socials in the corner, of the video.
12:54 And Maurizio, if you are watching, my good man, hang in there, baby.
13:00 It'll be fine. Goodbye.