Everyone loves what “The Tinkerman” is doing with Leicester City, especially the Foxes’ faithful, and while one Arsene Wenger is rightly or wrongly of the opinion that the 64-year-old former Chelsea manager is more responsible for The Blues’ rise and dominance since the turn of the century before Roman Abramovich’s purchase of the club in 2003 than his nemesis and archfoe, Jose Mourinho, it goes without saying how vital it has become for the Special One to start tinkering with his squad and tactics some more, especially with Branislav Ivanovic back from injury and straight back into the first team picture.
This has become imperative as it appears the club [management crew] have turned a corner having now realised – as though they never knew before – the importance of playing proper fullbacks in their proper positions, irrespective of their ”height” or even more generally, aerial prowess; it can’t be gainsaid or overemphasised that as much as we have sucked this season, having lost no less than eight times in seventeen competitive games so far, we aree yet to lose a game in 90 minutes when we field our best fullbacks, Cesar Azpilicueta and Baba Rahman, in the right and left fullback positions respectively. In fact, barring the penalty shoot-out loss to Stoke City in the League Cup last week, it’d have been a 100% winning outcome for us whenever we’ve played the two fullbacks together all season!
What’s worse? It’s ironic when you consider that as ‘small’ as Rahman theoretically is, no one has beaten him to an aerial let alone ground challenge in Chelsea colours, inasmuch as he’s not been found culpable for any of the 3 goals we’ve conceded with him on the pitch: one against Walsall, one against Stoke in the aforementioned Cup and the other in midweek against Dynamo Kiev in the Champions League. Practically speaking therefore, Mourinho’s excuse for benching the 21-year-old Ghanaian who arrived from German side Augsburg for £21m last summer for lacking in height with the inevitably grim consequence of fielding an essentially wasted Azpilicueta in an awkward position and a slow as f%ck and ageing Ivanovic in a position he no longer has business manning is, at best, a ludicrously otiose one. It has to stop as it serves no practical purpose for our cause other than to, well, see us losing more games by conceding preventable goals from the righthand side of defence, often much to the chagrin of our opponents!
The improvisations and resultant awkwardness and belaboured play simply have to stop, ASAP. Of course no one who knows their football would claim that Baba is the finished article, or, quite foolishly, that we will never concede a goal of which the kid will be directly culpable for, but it is only proper to work with round pegs when fixing round holes, isn’t it?
Thus, it is in that spirit that I present to you good folk of Vital Chelsea and our esteemed worldwide readership an alternative way of utilising the sheer height and, of course, the invaluable experience with which Ivanovic is blessed with, especially considering that the Mourinho I know or I think I know would not be averse to throwing the Serbian straight back bang into the thick of things, at the right back position no less if he somehow sees the need to, no matter whose ox is gored or potatoes boiled, as it were. After all, as far as [tactical] rigidity goes, it’s pretty fair to say The Special One’s takes the cake!
So, enough of my rambling now.
What if we tried Ivanovic further up field, in the ”Makelele role” alongside compatriot Nemanja Matic in the pivot? You know, Matic’s left foot deftly complementing his right foot in a position where searing pace and otherworldly technique isn’t necessarily the most stringent job requirement, keeping in mind that he nowadays sucks at right back and has always done at central defence?
Who knows, we just might be saving a career or two!
What do you think about this?
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