Djordje Petrovic, Nicolas Jackson, Marc Cucurella, Mykhailo Mudryk, Noni Madueke, Malo Gusto, Conor Gallagher, Moises Caicedo, Trevoh Chalobah, Cole Palmer, Benoit Badiashile.
That’s a standard lineup from the end of last season. There’s something that’s needed in the mix in that team according to Frank Lebouef – experience.
As Thiago Silva and Raheem Sterling played less and less towards the end of the campaign, the number of players with any reasonable number of Premier League games under their belt dwindled to just a few. Former Blues defender Lebouef thinks that’s a problem, as he pointed out for ESPN.
“Leverkusen have been absolutely fantastic with mostly unknown players… Xabi Alonso was so clever to bring only one player in the middle of the park, and he’s called [Granit] Xhaka playing for Arsenal. Everybody thought that the guy would go to pre-retirement to Leverkusen.
“Maybe Chelsea need a player like that, maybe as a centre-back, they need experienced players, but definitely in the middle of the park, somebody who is a leader, somebody who knows exactly what to do, somebody who can control everybody, make sure that everybody sticks to the same ideas. They definitely need somebody. The spine has to be reinforced at Chelsea.” he went on.
A tough thing to find
The importance of signing an experienced and mature player this summer is sharpened further by the reality that Chelsea are losing Thiago Silva’s experience. If they lose Conor Gallagher and Trevoh Chalobah too (and that’s odds on) they lose two of the more experienced first team players along with him. Beyond that, only Marc Cucurella and Moises Caicedo have more than two years of playing in the top flight under his belt from the regular starers by the end of last season.
Who could be our Xhaka? We need someone with 200 appearances and a lot of nous in this league, and they’re going to have to be ready to play a very specific type of football under Enzo Maresca.
Raphael Varane?