Enzo Maresca will have been frustrated with a draw today, considering his team went ahead at home but couldn’t hold on to win. But he was defiant in his chat with Chelsea TV after the game.
“I think the performance [today] once again was very good… City game I thought the team was really good, Wolves, again they repeated the performance.”
It’s definitely a good idea to not focus on results too much at this stage. Crystal Palace should have had a red card today, Chelsea could easily have scored other chances, then we end up with a win and it all feels rosy.
We also weren’t appalling against Man City in that first game. But there are also common issues to all of the games which need fixing, and points need to be on the board as quickly as possible. Let’s hope this two week break helps with that.
You can see the coach speaking in the clip embedded here:
Our biggest weakness thus far has been vulnerability to the counter. Most of this stems from bad giveaways with players committed forward and it’s compounded by a failure to close down the ball immediately after losing it.
One of Pep’s greatest mantras over the years has been the urgency of the re-press in the first few seconds after losing the ball. This is an adjustment many in the squad have yet to make and it leads to the other side getting out on the break. From there we’ve seen some naïveté in defense with players dropping too far off and failing to stop the ball (or failing to get back and defend at all). One assumes Maresca will get it sorted, but it’s also going to take some players adjusting their games. For example, Palmer CANNOT play in the middle of the park and fail to do the work defensively. Likewise, players like Caicedo and Enzo CANNOT commit bad giveaways and then fail to make the ball recovery (or foul) before the break starts. There’s a reason why players like Rodri and Fernandinho have been so prized at City over the years and right now we’re living the reality of what it looks like when you are missing that linchpin in the middle of the park.