Another season and
another Chelsea manager gets the chop.
Another Chelsea manager gets the sack after the players refuse to play
for him.
Just seems like those two
statements could be from any of the past ten years in English football but
there are some surprising factors to the story this week. Not least that the once untouchable, almost
demi-Godlike Jose Mourinho would go the same way of Carlo Ancelotti and Phil
Scolari as stories of the players not playing for the manager anymore, began to
do the rounds.
This was Mourinho’s
second spell as manager at Stamford Bridge with his first one bringing six
trophies in three seasons, the second one had not been as prolific yet still he
delivered the Premier League title for the third time.
Back in May Chelsea were
crowned Premier League Champions for the fourth time in their history and the
fifth time they have been Champions of England.
They won the league by eight points and looked odds-on to retain it
again this season, albeit fending off a sterner challenge from Manchester
City. Yet here we are barely five months
of football later and the Champions have jettisoned their most successful manager. So what has gone wrong?
There doesn’t seem to be
any one factor which has contributed to this, but what certainly can’t be
denied is Chelsea have not been unlucky.
When comparing with other
big clubs who have sacked managers in the last couple of seasons, Brendan
Rodgers and David Moyes for example, you can point to them having suffered some
bad luck. Of course you can also point
to many of their problems being self-inflicted.
But Chelsea haven’t really had many injuries in the past five months, they
haven’t been victim to many poor refereeing decisions. They haven’t had some of their best players
just decide to leave or retire. What
they do seem to have is a vast number of players either alarmingly losing form
or just finding it impossible to get themselves going this season, or they just
decided they didn’t want Jose in charge anymore.
People have pointed to
things going wrong right from pre-season.
It was suggested the players didn’t have a proper build-up to the season
with the club preferring to fly them all over the world to add more shirt sales
than preparing the players to be the first club to retain the title for seven
years. They were also called back to
pre-season training a little later than usual owing to many of them needing a
longer rest.
Then on the opening day
of the season Mourinho had a spat with club doctor, Eva Caneiro when the
Portuguese objected to her going onto the pitch to administer treatment to Eden
Hazard. This always seemed a strange
episode and looking back perhaps started the downhill slide which eventually
lead to his demise.
Chelsea were struggling
to see off a Swansea team at home and things were compounded by the sending off
of their keeper, Thibaut Courtois.
Hazard went down under a challenge and immediately Caneiro and physio,
Jon Fearn, went to assist. As Hazard was
treated on the pitch he was then obliged to walk to the touchline and wait for
the referee to allow him back on. This
meant Chelsea were down to nine men and this seems to be what incensed
Mourinho. The club backed their manager,
Caneiro was demoted and made her way to her lawyers, and the spectre of Hazard
being injured was to re-emerge this week to haunt Mourinho.
After dropping points at
home to Swansea, they were then well beaten at Manchester City and their first
win of the season (at West Brom) was soon expunged by defeats at home to Palace
and away to Everton. By the time
Southampton came to Stamford Bridge and came away with all three points, the
Champions had lost four of their opening eight fixtures. Within this sequence was an impressive win
over Arsenal where they finally showed the form of last season.
But consecutive defeats
to West Ham, Liverpool and Stoke City just compounded the misery. At home to Liverpool they took an early lead
but were ultimately swept aside showing defensive frailties unheard of from a
Mourinho side. What did for Jose in the
end were back-to-back league defeats to Bournemouth and Leicester City.
Mourinho’s record at
Stamford Bridge this season has taken a real pounding. He went seventy-seven games without losing at
home as Chelsea manager before Sunderland prevailed in April 2014. But thirteen points from a possible
twenty-seven at home just hasn’t been good enough for the owner, and with just
one win away from home this is what sat them just above the relegation zone.
We may never know why
many players, who were excellent last season, have suffered such a slump in
form but the likes of Azpilacueta, one of the best defenders in the league,
Hazard, footballer of the year last season, Ivanovic, Costa, Fabregas and Oscar
have just been woeful. On Monday night
at Leicester, Hazard went down under a challenge from Jamie Vardy and received
treatment. Mourinho tried to get him
back on the pitch but the player took one step and then shrugged his shoulders
and flounced off. Mourinho’s comments at
the end of the game suggested he was not best pleased with this behaviour.
That post-match interview
ultimately put the nails in the coffin as Mourinho chose to criticise his
players rather than desperately try and defend them. He had tried to criticise them earlier in the
season, even dropping Matic, Terry and one or two others, but had recently
sought to build them up. He appeared to
lose patience as he accused them of ignoring his pre-match tactics.
I think there’s far too
much fuss made of whether a manager should criticise his players or not. For a player who seeks to share no
responsibility in a defeat, he may clearly object to any negativity towards
him. But a player has to be able to take
criticism of his performance, however it is offered. There are plenty of opportunities for a
manager to back his players, but if he cannot ever make his disappointment
known then he is making a rod for his own back where some players believe they
are above criticism, and therefore do not have to play to their best in every
match. Players need to be treated
differently by managers and who are we to suggest that the manager does not
understand how his players’ minds work?
But if a player is to
take his manager’s criticism and decide not to bother playing for him, then his
sulking is letting down himself, his teammates, the club and their supporters
just because he wants to spite the manager.
It’s a measure of the power players have these days they can afford to
risk the fortunes of their club in order to force the owners into making a
managerial change, knowing their future at that same club may pass unaffected.
But have the Chelsea
players underestimated their position with the fans? From the reaction at the first game of
post-Mourinho Chelsea mark two, it would appear they have. The supporters seem pretty clear in who is to
blame, singling out Ivanovic, Costa and Hazard.
Diego Costa was booed off when substituted and no doubt some of the
cheers for Ivanovic scoring the first goal were ironic.
As I mentioned at the
start of this piece, Chelsea players have form where this is concerned and
previously the fans have always backed them.
But it appears they have over-egged their popularity one time too many.
The club have moved
quickly to appoint a stop-gap with Guus Hiddink returning to Stamford Bridge for
his second spell after he held that position in 2009 after the players decided
they’d had enough of Scolari. He lost
just one match during his four month spell and oversaw an FA Cup victory. Ultimately, Chelsea will need to find a
permanent replacement with Pep Guardiola and Diego Simeone being
mentioned. Much may depend on the
freedom a new man is given, but he would be taking over a squad much unchanged
from that which lifted the Premier League title in May.
It could be an
interesting end to the season if Chelsea find themselves still embroiled in a
relegation battle. Clubs who have come
through the battle successfully often point to team spirit being an important
factor. But if some players still hold
resentment in Mourinho being ousted by other players then when the pressure
reaches boiling point it will be interesting to see whether they stick together
or start ripping each other apart.
I expect Chelsea to get
themselves out of the mess they’re in and where I said you couldn’t point to
them being unlucky, this would now be to their advantage. It may sound simple but all they need to do
is play as they can and they should gain enough points to fight off any threat
of relegation, but European qualification for next season looks impossible,
unless they can win the Champions League.
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