Despite the draw with Nottingham Forest, Enzo Maresca's Chelsea have made a strong start to the season and go into the International Break deserving of their place in the top 4. But after the struggles of last season, how have The Blues hit the ground running so quickly this time? Adam Clery looks at the side's tactics from front to back and explains why this could be a great season for them.
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00:00Now, before we start, very quickly, some housekeeping.
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00:25So there will come a point in this video where I start to do something and you go, he's not,
00:29he's not actually going to do that, is he?
00:31And yes, yes, I am actually going to do that, but you'll, you'll see what I mean later.
00:36Anyway, yes, the thing you're actually here for, this is Enzo Moresca's Chelsea, and they've
00:40been doing really, really well this season.
00:43They've got a nice established back two for Fafana and Caldwell, we like them very much.
00:47Caicedo and Fernandes have somehow become a successful double pivot, despite that never
00:51ever working under Pochettino.
00:54Cole Palmer is the number 10.
00:55There's a rotating cast of characters in the wide positions.
00:58And Nicholas Jackson finally looks like the kind of baller that I said he might be able
01:05to be eventually.
01:06But the thing about this is that while it is this, it is also crucially not that ever.
01:13And aside from the fact they didn't win, that Forrest performance was actually fairly typical
01:16of how Moresca's got them playing.
01:18And this is their average positions map from that game, and you'll see it's not 4-2-3-1
01:24at all, really, is it?
01:25Like, Malagusto's all the way up here, he's actually playing further forward than Caicedo,
01:30and Enzo Fernandes is sort of out around here somewhere.
01:33Palmer's actually not in the 10 position, he's far further across.
01:36Jackson's really deep.
01:37It's not anything like this basic shape.
01:40And that's because fundamentally, Moresca is taking what he did at Leicester, what was
01:43so successful in the Championship, and he has not adopted it, but he is adapting it.
01:49And at Leicester, he wouldn't just invert one of his full backs into the midfield to
01:53give him an extra body there.
01:54He would then push the goalkeeper into the back line, so he could retain a back four
01:59in the process.
02:00But he decided very quickly at Chelsea he wasn't going to be able to do that, because
02:03at Leicester he had one of the best ball-playing goalkeepers in that league, and in Robert
02:08Sanchez, he has a competent ball-playing goalkeeper, but not one of the best.
02:12Like, if you remember, the guy lost his place at Brighton to Jason Steele for a while, so
02:16probably a bit too much of a risk to do that exactly.
02:20So what happens instead is that Sanchez sort of stays out of it, Malagusto comes in the
02:24middle alongside Caicedo, and the rest of the defence sort of shuffle over, and we get
02:28this 3-2 shape.
02:30Now, however, one of their biggest strengths is that while they do always do this shape,
02:34they don't always do it this way.
02:36Like this is Malagusto's heat map from this season, and that's very obvious to spot.
02:40It's absolutely a full back who was asked to move into the middle.
02:44There's a lot of this flank where he does his general full backing, but also he's spending
02:48a lot of time on the ball in the centre of the pitch.
02:51But if we look at Marc Cucaracha's heat map from this season, you will see exactly the
02:56same thing.
02:57Now, if you've watched Chelsea this season, you might not have spotted Cucaracha going
03:01and doing that, because he doesn't do it anywhere near as often, but he is an option for it.
03:05And the reason for that is Levi Caldwell.
03:08Enzo Moresca loves him to be the central of these three defenders, because out of all
03:13of them, he's got the best passing, he's the coolest under pressure.
03:17You can invite a press on to him like this, and he is the one most comfortable playing through it.
03:22So in an ideal world, this is what he wants his buttery biscuit build-up base to look like.
03:27Gusto comes into the middle, that pulls Caldwell into the centre, everyone is in their best position.
03:31But one thing I think is becoming very quickly apparent about Moresca as a manager, and something
03:36I think he deserves enormous credit for already, is that it's clear that he doesn't just want
03:41his players to be able to carry out his style of play the way he imagines it, he also wants
03:46to empower them to problem solve on the pitch.
03:50So this build-up shape being preferred, but flexible, gives them the ability to do that.
03:54Like maybe it works first time, maybe it works the whole game, maybe everything is kittens
03:58and puppies and rainbows and strong bro dark fruits and other stuff, but maybe, also, it doesn't.
04:04So now you flip the script and everybody sort of moves around one, and the problems that
04:08causes for the opposition are that if their press is, say, man to man, and certain players
04:13are supposed to go to Gusto, certain players are supposed to go to Kukerea, all of a sudden
04:17that totally messes with that system, they've got to recalibrate, maybe that buys you a
04:21bit of time, a few passages of play where you can move through.
04:24But also, as well, because they're both comfortable inverting, you can't just have them both invert
04:31and swap it around to a 2-3 instead of a 3-2.
04:34But now, ho ho ho, any teams that are pressing you zonally rather than man for man, oh no,
04:39they have committed the wrong number of players to the wrong areas of the pitch.
04:43So before they can figure that out, maybe that buys you a few passages of play as well
04:47and you can get through.
04:49Just when they have the answers, change the f***ing questions.
04:53And you can spot this happening in games if you look out for it, like this is the Forest
04:56game, very early on, very clear, this is the shape they want.
05:00They want Gusto there and they want 3 there, but as it goes on, that becomes harder to
05:05make work.
05:06The way they press is actually quite good, so aha, they change it around and now Kouka
05:11Reus here and they're just making it harder and harder to figure out.
05:14But also, just to be very basic about this, the other main benefit of this shape is that
05:19it is a lot more stable.
05:21Chelsea conceded so many goals last season, from the ball getting turned over anywhere
05:27on the pitch and them just being really disorganised, players all over the place, not getting back
05:32in position, and the opposition just runs up the other end and scores.
05:35So of course, one of the main benefits of this is it's really, really narrow, your full
05:39backs aren't being asked to bomb all the way up the other flanks and getting completely
05:44caught out.
05:45If they do lose the ball anywhere, it's very hard for the other team to do anything through
05:49the middle.
05:50They still have to go out wide and that buys you time.
05:52And also, this obviously isn't really a tactical thing, but when you watch Chelsea defend last
05:56season and you watch them defend this season, there's clearly better buy-in over what they're
06:01doing.
06:02There's more energy, more effort to recover.
06:04There's more enthusiasm in the backtracking runs.
06:07Like to put it simply, there's more desire to work like this.
06:10There is more hunger for it.
06:17Speaking of ravenous, it's time to play a fun game of is he going to make this delicious
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06:33Now, fun fact, right?
06:36The last time we did one of these videos, I made some crack about how, oh, I like to
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08:34Anyway, back to the video.
08:40Genuinely, really nice that.
08:42Anyway, yes.
08:43So stable base.
08:44Yes.
08:45So when Maresca gets the Chelsea job, probably the two biggest questions are A, how's he
08:50going to use Colpalmer?
08:51And B, how's he going to use Enzo Fernandez?
08:53And the beauty of this system is it allows you to do that fabled box midfield where you
08:57sort of have dual 8s slash 10s in the system.
09:01And that should theoretically be the perfect use of both of those players.
09:05Now, for Palma, it absolutely is.
09:07We did a video just on him specifically that is on the channel.
09:10You can go and give that a watch.
09:12But one of the major takeaways from it was he loves to be in this half space here.
09:16He is the 10.
09:17Yes.
09:18But he doesn't want to be too central and he doesn't want to be too far right.
09:21He wants to be in this gap between the two.
09:23It makes him an absolute nightmare to mark.
09:25It gives him the sort of space to create chances for other players.
09:28It gives him the sort of space to attack, to create chances for himself.
09:32He has been fantastic in this role.
09:34His heart is singing.
09:35On the other side, and maybe this is a little bit harsh, he's only played like five games
09:40or something this season.
09:41I do not think this is getting the best out of Enzo Fernandez yet.
09:46Now, if you watched any of the videos I did on Chelsea last season, you will know I think
09:50he is a wonderful, dogged, creative, intelligent footballer.
09:54I'm just waiting for whatever his role is at Chelsea to finally click.
09:58And I thought it would be this.
10:01But so far, it isn't.
10:03Like the beauty of having these two eight slash tens is how it works with the two wide
10:08players, because either they will hold their width.
10:10They'll stay really wide.
10:12That'll stretch the defense.
10:13And that gives these players the space to play into.
10:16Or if they drop off and manage to pull a defender with them, it gives them the space
10:20to directly attack in behind.
10:22And then you want players in these positions who are creative, who are also intelligent,
10:26like Palmer and Fernandez are, and that gives them the chance to create.
10:29Like you've seen a million squabillion of these Chelsea chances already this season.
10:35Intelligent movement, manipulating the defender, creating the space, and then the ball coming
10:39in.
10:40But the problem is that right now it is almost always Cole Palmer playing that killer ball,
10:44whether it's to the player on his side or a good cross or a through ball to the opposite
10:48side.
10:49And the numbers so far make for pretty damning reading.
10:52Like if you look at the number of key passes in the Premier League this season, and a key
10:56pass is just anything that leads to a shot directly.
10:59Cole Palmer's ninth.
11:00He's in the top 10 of all the players in the league and Enzo Fernandez is down in 137th.
11:08And that is per 90 minutes, by the way, that's not total because I know he hasn't played
11:12the full season.
11:13It's just his current rate of output.
11:15In fact, actually, I know I normally ask for like comments and stuff at the end, but if
11:18you're a Chelsea fan, where do you stand on Enzo Fernandez?
11:22Like is he a brilliant player who just isn't quite fitting into various versions of this
11:26side or is there just something missing from his game?
11:30Like I always think it's the former.
11:31I always think he's amazing.
11:32It's just not working yet.
11:33But now it hasn't worked so many times, I'm starting to wonder.
11:38Thoughts, feelings, just anything about Fernandez, I would be very interested to read that.
11:42If there is maybe one saving grace about Fernandez just not having the creative output he needs
11:48on that side, it's possibly that Maurescu has got this system designed that that's not
11:52really a problem.
11:53Like another bonus of having Malegusto being the one that inverts is that puts him right
11:58behind Cole Palmer.
11:59Now, Cole Palmer, again, as we discussed in the other video, which you should go and watch
12:04at some point, he doesn't just like to move away from the 10 position.
12:07He likes to drop extremely deep, like sometimes he just wants to get on the ball.
12:11And this is his heat map in the Forest game.
12:13Very convenient for me, who says he plays in this half space.
12:16You can see he's spending most of the game in the half space.
12:18But there's also this little blob just sort of here.
12:21And if you do an usher, you take that, you rewind it back to the Brighton game where
12:25he got four goals, you can actually see he did most of his work in that right back, right
12:31wing back area.
12:32And that's just him going to find the ball, which Maurescu absolutely encourages him to
12:36do.
12:37And against a high line like Brighton, he did it more because when he got on it, there
12:39was more chances to play the ball in behind, less against Forest because they were defending.
12:44But the reason I mentioned Malagusto is because when Palmer just vacates that area, having
12:48a fullback who likes to go forward in that position, he doesn't let the fact he's now
12:53central stop him from doing that.
12:55And he will just swap.
12:56Like this is just a still image, admittedly, because this all happened very, very fast.
13:00But if you plot out Palmer and Gusto here, like Palmer's dropped all the way off to get
13:04on the ball, Gusto's carried his run on all the way through.
13:07In fact, if you look at the Forest game again, go back to Gusto, heat map and pass map, he
13:12was actually doing way more here than he was here, which again, just like the buildup shape,
13:18it's not their identity.
13:19It's not plan A, but it's another way in which Maurescu encourages them to problem solve
13:24mid-match.
13:25In an ideal world, he wants Cole Palmer here and Gusto there, but if the situation arises
13:30where it makes sense to swap, they are swapping.
13:33I think this might be where a lot of people who did those big preview videos and those
13:37preview articles about Enzo Maurescu and how he's so tactically rigid, he's going to make
13:42them play one way.
13:44Maybe myself included, I can't actually remember, might owe him a bit of an apology because
13:49it feels like game to game, they change their identity very well.
13:54Like I mentioned before there, how much Cole Palmer dropped off, sat deep and exploited
13:58Brighton's high line in that match and Chelsea were, in my opinion, much the better team.
14:02They'd got the goals that their performance deserved and they had like 40% possession.
14:08Even though they were at home, they allowed Brighton to dominate the ball and they picked
14:11them off really, really well.
14:13But then in the Forest game, which let's face it, they absolutely should have won.
14:17They went to a far more possession-based system, they had 65, 66% of the ball.
14:23They went from being like deep and counterattacking and exploiting space to swarming and dominating
14:28and pulling them apart from a low block.
14:30And that's genuinely quite impressive to have done in the space of like, what, eight
14:35Premier League games?
14:36The guy's come in, he's recognised a limitation in his own system, by the way he wanted the
14:41goalkeeper to move forward, so he didn't do that, he changed it up straight away.
14:44But also he recognised he's working with better players who have more to their game than perhaps
14:49some of the lads he had in the Championship and put them in a system that was rigid and
14:54had structure and was going to let them do things really, really well.
14:56But also was open, was fluid, was quite happy to proverbially chuck its keys in a bowl.
15:04And you combine that with gradual coaching improvements he's clearly making in the side,
15:08like Nicholas Jackson's shot conversion numbers are still not amazing, but they're twice as
15:13good as they were last season, so you can see some development there.
15:17And this is a team not going to get carried away, but could really, if this continues,
15:24do something.
15:25Don't be vague.
15:26What do you mean, do something, Adam?
15:27Don't say that and then follow through.
15:29Well, I think this could be a side that quite comfortably qualifies for the Champions League
15:36and could be in the conversation for other things as the season goes on.
15:41Could, could, could.
15:42And if not else, you know what it is, I tipped them to win the league last season, looked
15:45like a complete mug for doing so, but I just, I knew in this crop of players there was a
15:51song to be sung.
15:53So it's nice that we're starting to hear it.
15:56Anyway, yes, at long last, that is why Enzo Morescu's Chelsea are really good and fun
16:00and I like them.
16:02So please let me know what you thought of all this in the comments below.
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16:41And until next time, yeah, there you go.
16:46I can't say I don't listen to you, because so many people asked for this video, so here
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16:52Hope you enjoyed it, and share it, because, yeah, bye.