This is why Chelsea are struggling

With 5 games remaining in the Premier League season, Chelsea look like they’re just barely hanging on to the race for a Champions League place. They squeaked out a win vs. Fulham last week despite generating under 1 xG for the entire game, but there’s no denying that the Blues simply haven’t been playing very well since February.

You’d expect they could squeak one out again against an Everton team with nothing to play for, so a related piece of business before we move on:

Over on the Premium betting newsletter, Ted has his money on Everton +1, meaning he gets the W with a draw and his money back with a one-goal loss. “I’m not excited to be on Everton away,” he says, “but it feels like there is just a little too much value in this line.”

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Only 2 of Chelsea’s 30 highest xG chances from this season have come in their last 10 games. Their total xG is down about 0.5 per 90 over this period of time, now very much mid-table. Their xG per shot is absolutely in the toilet.

This is reflected in the stats of Chelsea’s two highest profile attackers, who have faced significant criticism recently. Cole Palmer was one of the best players in the league during the first half of the season, performing at a similar level to Bukayo Saka and Mohamed Salah. But his downturn in high-quality shot generation — both for himself and his teammates — has mirrored Chelsea’s as a whole.

Nicolas Jackson was absent for 2 months and is still working his way back into form, but he’s not found his scoring touch again. The team and Palmer’s comparison’s above were for Chelsea’s last 10 games vs. their previous 23, but Jackson’s here is a bit different — before and after his most recent Premier League goal, in December against Brentford. He’s still putting in excellent pressing effort and is actually setting up his teammates more, but like Palmer, his shot value has plummeted.

Palmer and Jackson would probably admit they’re not in top form, but this is a team-wide problem, not one caused by individuals playing poorly. Chelsea, as a whole, are not running at people anymore. They’re not playing into space, either with through balls or dribbling.

Here they are before February, creating a ton of high value shots through those means.

Here they are since February, creating absolutely nothing with through balls and dribbling. Chelsea are generating more shots on a per-90 basis over this time period, but basically no high quality ones.

I had a hypothesis why: Manager Enzo Maresca’s preferred slow buildup possession style does not fit his personnel at all, and as his team gets closer to playing the way he wants, they are getting worse. Today’s newsletter is out later than usual because I spent some time digging to see if this made any sense, and uhh…. yes it does. There’s a lot of evidence to support that this is happening.

Chelsea have become less direct, are keeping the ball more, are running at people less, and are creating much lower quality chances as a result. He has a team full of players who are outstanding athletes and excellent transitional players, but not particularly talented at breaking down deep defenses. When they don’t have a lot of space to play into centrally, they get frustrated, take the space that’s given to them wide, and settle for crosses.

Championship followers might remember that a similar thing happened to Marseca’s Leicester City team last season. While they won the title and promotion, the Foxes were average down the stretch, and lost a handful of very dull 1-0 games.

Maresca really does not care for being questioned about his ideology or asked to compromise it. “I arrive in this club to play with this idea,” he said in an interview last January while at Leicester. “The moment there is some doubt about the idea, the day after, I will leave. It’s so clear. No doubts.”

One year later, he has not learned to compromise one bit.

Chelsea have the talent to win all of their final 5 games and secure a place in the Champions League. Despite all the space that this newsletter has given to mocking their transfer policy, I still think the Blues are more talented than Aston Villa and Nottingham Forest, and should go on to secure 5th place.

But they’re not going to do it playing the way they have recently, or playing Maresca’s preferred style, period. It doesn’t suit this squad. This Chelsea squad excels in a more transitional game, creating chaos and running at people. And looking longer term, either Maresca or Chelsea’s transfer policy will need to change dramatically for this team to be a success.

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