Nicolas Jackson made another catastrophic error today, picking up his second red card in three games when he lunged in over the top of the ball against Flamengo.
Speaking after the game, his manager Enzo Maresca ducked the chance to criticise his player once again.
“What do I think? It was a red card, nothing to say. I haven’t spoken to him yet,” the Chelsea coach said.
We understand that Maresca is avoiding calling out his player in public – but perhaps after seeing him makes the same mistakes again and again he might think it’s time to try a new tack?
Marc Cucurella willing to call out stupid mistake by teammate
However, as Marc Cucurella revealed in speaking to the press after the game, the striker did indeed apologise to his teammates after the game. Cucurella at least had the stones to openly criticise his teammate, even in the mildest terms:
“He’s a young player with a lot of quality but maybe needs to improve a little bit in these things. He has to learn. After the manager spoke, he said sorry [and that] he didn’t do it on purpose.”
Jon Obi Mikel, a pundit for DAZN, was much more open:
“Unbelievable. Stupid stupid stupid mistake. I don’t know what was going through his head.
“Your team needs you and he does that. He did the same at Newcastle… you can’t keep making these mistakes.”
Maresca surely running out of patience with Jackson
Whatever Maresca says publicly, he must be fuming behind the scenes. Even before the Italian coach arrived at the club there were questions about the striker’s temperament and maturity. Since then not much has changed – if anything things are trending in the wrong direction.
With Liam Delap now in the squad, Jackson’s place as first choice striker is surely under serious threat now.
Our coach is not capable to lead us go anywhere because of the information that used atimes is totally rong. Using JAMES at midfield is not working well since Using him as a midfielder we don’t get result. I don’t why LAVIA is who can play it better you bench him for what. Zero technique. Not capable at all
Try to write in English language next time, bro
Honestly speaking, Maresca is lacking when it comes to imagination. Why do I say so? Chelsea has a skillful midfielder called Romeo Lavia who posses the skills and imagination to slice open the oppositions midfield in order to create opportunities for the powerful new striker Delap.
It is high time that Maresca should utilize the well-known Italian strategy of employing three highly mobile defenders protected by 5 midfielders and two strikers.
That was a strategy employed by Italy when they won the world cup in Spain in 1982 at which they eliminated the highly skillful Brazilian team consisting of Zico, Socrates and Roberto Falcao at the quarterfinals stage. The same team also defeated Argentina who had a 22 year old Diego Maradona.