Liam Twomey’s latest report on the situation at Chelsea for the Athletic is desperately disappointing for Blues fans who want to see the sporting directors who are overseeing the club at the moment face some consequences for a third manager being sacked in the span of two seasons.
Laurence Stewart and Paul Winstanley apparently are not under fire. “Fan discontent with the co-sporting directors is not reflected inside the club. Stewart and Winstanley retain the total confidence and unequivocal backing of Chelsea’s ownership,” Twomey writes.
There is a belief that the pair “has assembled one of the three most talented squads in the Premier League,” so the blame should fall on the coach who took that group to 6th. That’s some pretty nice job security to have, knowing that you get credit when you do well and get to fire the guy beneath you when you do badly. We are watching from behind our hands to see what damage they do this summer.
Embedded deeper than ever
It seems that Steward and Winstanley, who have gradually taken more and more of the blame from Chelsea fans over the last 18 months as their plans have become clear and their decisions have had time to take effects, are actually more strongly entrenched than ever.
In a mix of the sunk cost fallacy and a simply “doubling down,” it seems the owners have decided that changing the sporting directors reflects badly on them, while changing coach just reflects badly on the sporting directors.
So in a true case of failing upwards, a year after taking several months to work out the perfect candidate (who has now proved to be the wrong candidate, it turns out) the chuckle brothers now get to start the whole process again, confident in the knowledge that their jobs are seemingly safe no matter how many appointments they bungle.
