Navid Deen has a few more than reasonable suggestions.
Whenever the team struggles it resorts to “hoofball” and at least twice Sarri has said post-match that “this is not my football“.
In England, there has always been a tendency to “go long” when chasing the game. And of course if you have a proper target man such as Diego Costa, you can play diagonal balls to them to hold up play, whilst support comes from midfield.
We now have, Eden, Willian and Pedro leading the front line and none of them can actually head the ball or are likely to win an aerial battle with a six and a half feet tall defender. So, when we revert to type (from previous managers) and pump long high diagonal balls, there is only ever going to be one winner and it’s not Chelsea.
Sarri’s system requires a quick, strong, ball playing striker who runs into the box (not to the wings) AND gets a shot off on goal.
The frontman in Sarri’s system scores a lot of goals because that is the system. Mertens did great for Napoli during Sarri’s reign but not so well for Belgium. Higuain did great for Napoli during Sarri’s reign but has not done as well since he moved on.
It’s no surprise that Hazard is our leading scorer.
However, Hazard is not a natural goal scorer. He is a creator of the highest order.
No, we need a Sarri type goal scorer who can control the ball fired into him, run at pace and score at will.
In my opinion, the ideal striker that we need is Aguero. I know, I know that we could not prise him away from Manchester City and I’m not suggesting that we could. What I am saying is that he is the type of striker that we need.
We then have to banish the thought of a target man (we can retain Giroud for that) and instead look at players similar to Antoine Greizmann, Neymar or Luis Suarez.
Or maybe even an Alexis Sanchez?
Higuain is obviously Sarri’s chosen one but it should only be a short-term loan. If successful, he could only be offered a yearly contract and I’m not sure that a player of his stature would accept this. He has also been out of the first team at AC Milan so I’m not sure that he would be able to hit the ground running from January 2019. I think that he might struggle.
I would be delighted if Jamie Vardy came to us as he is a speed merchant with a nasty streak and exactly what we need. We should have got him sooner but now as a shorter-term fix, yes please!
If he is fit, then Arnautovic could serve Chelsea very well so long as the price is right. A front line of Hazard, Arnautovic and Vardy would get us over the line for this season.
I know we tried to get Anthony Martial before and if we could pull it off, he could the full-time centre-forward for years to come. Super talent but I doubt that United would sell him to us and if they did, it would cost a fortune.
Vardy or Arnautovic for the striker roles would be a great transfer window. But we know that the likelihood of getting them is very remote indeed.
Until such time that we buy or unearth a suitable striker, we need to continue with what we have.
If we are to continue with Morata or Giroud (both of whom normally fail to score even on a good day) then why not try Loftus-Cheek up front with Hazard and Hudson-Odoi on either side of him.
Worth a try in my opinion and it cannot be any worse, striker-wise than what we have at the moment.
We are more likely to get Higuain and if we do, I will, of course support him as a Chelsea player.
What do you think?
KTBFFH!
Previous article by Navid Deen
Could Any Other Present Chelsea Player Have Scored The Kante Goal Against Crystal Palace?