There’s a sense that Chelsea fans are increasingly uncertain that Marc Cucurella will be a star for this team.
Interestingly, WhoScored had him as the joint top rated outfield player for the Blues against Brentford tonight, with a 7.3 rating, but that wasn’t reflected in the grumbling online and in the stands.
After a bright start in his first couple of games, there’s been a bit of disappointment about his contributions. A lot of people are concluding that he’s just solid – and that we seriously overpaid for him.
It should be noted that a lot of his appearances have come as a left sided centre back, not a position that allows him to shine most.
But today he was at left wing back, and didn’t do enough offensively for most people. There’s plenty of time for him to develop, but he’s going to have to do more in the final third in games like this if he wants to replace Ben Chilwell as number one.
Definitely overpaid for Cucurella, but we knew that before he even donned the jersey. Everyone knew we were losing Alonso and therefore in a jam. We were always going to get gouged. Hopefully he pans out, even if it’s as a back-up to Chillwell.
As for the stats, isn’t it telling that the starting front three “scored” more poorly than the guys who finished the game leading the attack—Auba, Sterling, and Pulisic? Seems like the manager picked the wrong starters or got his tactics wrong. Had the game lasted another 5-10 mins, we looked likely to get a goal. Too bad these guys weren’t given more of a chance.
For as long as we are playing without a recognized Defensive Midfielder it’s just going to be difficult. We will not get the best of G5 or Kovacic or Mount because of the extra burden of protecting the defense.
I thought Potter was going to play Denis Zakaria and leave Mount and Auba as the front two, supported by Kovacic. I just don’t get it.
As a wing back he still showed he’s a better option than Chilwell at the moment also should be noticed that we played more through the right side than the left