Enzo Maresca - Chelsea manager - Sack watch

tomaldinho1 said:
It's mental that an out of form United everyone knows are struggling getting beaten 2-0 by a decent Newcastle team makes more headlines than Chelsea, supposedly competing for the title, losing to Ipswich
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Well one is seen as a blip, for now, while the other is Manchester United, the biggest clubs in the land, in free fall. United fans always post this stuff as if we all don’t already know United are the biggest story in town no matter what is happening at other clubs ;)
 
WeePat said:
Well one is seen as a blip, for now, while the other is Manchester United, the biggest clubs in the land, in free fall. United fans always post this stuff as if we all don’t already know United are the biggest story in town no matter what is happening at other clubs ;)
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Are you lot not bored of it by now, seems like there's only so many times you can read the same stuff with different adjectives. I saw Maresca started Felix, a bold move!
 
tomaldinho1 said:
Are you lot not bored of it by now, seems like there's only so many times you can read the same stuff with different adjectives. I saw Maresca started Felix, a bold move!
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Bored of what? Media going hard on United news? Not really. I’m not inundated with it and I don’t go out of my way looking for it. I know it’s there though, as the top line news item on all the main sports news platforms is United.
 
Very concerning signs this month - starting to worry that my fears around this appointment were founded.

35 points after 19 games would’ve had us 6th last year. I think if we finish outside of top 4/5 come the end of the season, it won’t have been good enough. Not convinced about his ability to set up a defence, or change the system when required. He’s told us time and again that Nkunku isn’t a lone 9, and yet he started him there tonight. Why not change the shape when we’re chasing a two goal deficit & go two up top? How Disasi even started, let alone lasted 77 mins is beyond me. Absolutely stealing a living.

Need a big second half of the season, hopefully James can be the catalyst for that. Think we’ve missed him & Lavia hugely in recent weeks.
 
Real crisis developing if you don't beat Palace once in a league season. That will be a very tricky game with what they have on the break.

I think you'll still finish top 4/5 which was the main objective of the season.
 
Reezy said:
Very concerning signs this month - starting to worry that my fears around this appointment were founded.

35 points after 19 games would’ve had us 6th last year. I think if we finish outside of top 4/5 come the end of the season, it won’t have been good enough. Not convinced about his ability to set up a defence, or change the system when required. He’s told us time and again that Nkunku isn’t a lone 9, and yet he started him there tonight. Why not change the shape when we’re chasing a two goal deficit & go two up top? How Disasi even started, let alone lasted 77 mins is beyond me. Absolutely stealing a living.

Need a big second half of the season, hopefully James can be the catalyst for that. Think we’ve missed him & Lavia hugely in recent weeks.
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He was overrated last month and now he is being underrated. Nothing new in football.
 
RDCR07 said:
He was overrated last month and now he is being underrated. Nothing new in football.
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I don’t think acknowledging the fact that he’s had a pretty shocking month means he’s now being underrated.

These criticisms also aren’t anything new - they were highlighted by Leicester fans last season when they had a dip. Particularly around his tactical rigidity. He managed to get things back on track last year, albeit with the strongest squad in the Championship. He doesn’t have the best players in the league this time, but I certainly hope he can arrest this downturn in form as he did last season. Time will tell.

As someone who was admittedly hugely underwhelmed by his appointment, I’d still probably give him around a 7/10 so far. There’s been a big improvement in some patterns of play, and he did well to get us to 2nd. But as mentioned, I think the latter is hugely down to other teams underperforming. Despite City’s awful run, we’re now only 4 points above them and I’m not confident we’ll finish the season above them. Maresca was obviously right to downplay any ‘title-race’ talk, but in emphasising it so heavily I think he’s bred some complacency into the squad in recent weeks.
 
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Things not going well in dressing room it seems. The moment maresca said under utilised players can move on if they feel didn't get game time after final conference league game.
 
With the attention over the last few months being on Ange and Amorim is this guy going under the radar? They've been pretty dull for a while now from what I've seen, was their good start at the beginning of the season just momentum from Poch? Probably going to drop of out the top 4 this weekend.
 
J2J said:
With the attention over the last few months being on Ange and Amorim is this guy going under the radar? They've been pretty dull for a while now from what I've seen, was their good start at the beginning of the season just momentum from Poch? Probably going to drop of out the top 4 this weekend.
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Maresca is in 4th. Ange is sitting 14th and Amorim in 13th, albeit he took over mid season. I’d hope there would be more attention on what is going on at United and Spurs than then the team that has been in the top 4 pretty much all season - a team most people didn’t even have in the top 6 I should add.
 
WeePat said:
Maresca is in 4th. Ange is sitting 14th and Amorim in 13th, albeit he took over mid season. I’d hope there would be more attention on what is going on at United and Spurs than then the team that has been in the top 4 pretty much all season - a team most people didn’t even have in the top 6 I should add.
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Fair enough, I had just heard rumblings amongst Chelsea fans over the last few months, are you content with him then?
 
J2J said:
Fair enough, I had just heard rumblings amongst Chelsea fans over the last few months, are you content with him then?
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I don’t have a problem with Maresca just yet. It’s only been half a season and we were good for a significant portion of the season so far. I expect him to rectify the problems and halt the slide. I’ll judge him at the end of the season.

If he gets us into the CL, then no problems, but if we finish below 5th, then it might be yet another manager in a very sticky situation.
 
They have a great midfield but really they kinda live and die on the back of Palmer’s performances it seems, albeit I don’t watch all their games
 
they’ll always have those 3 or so hours people thought they might be in the title race.
 
stepic said:
They have a great midfield but really they kinda live and die on the back of Palmer’s performances it seems, albeit I don’t watch all their games
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Caciedo been good generally but I just don't think him and Enzo as a duo is dynamic enough and we'd had 18 months of them now. Some of Chelsea's best performances have been with Lavia but he's just not available enough for them.
 
FootballHQ said:
Caciedo been good generally but I just don't think him and Enzo as a duo is dynamic enough and we'd had 18 months of them now. Some of Chelsea's best performances have been with Lavia but he's just not available enough for them.
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Yeah they seem a little too similar style wise.
 
I’m not having Chelsea are still doing well/no one expected them to do well, no chance. When they were comfortably top 4 a couple months back I thought ‘well that should be expected given what they’ve spent’. If they don’t get top 4 again this season it’s another shambles, especially given the position they were in.
They’ll probably sell a hotel again this summer and spend like mad kings but no one will bat an eyelid.

Obviously we’re in another league of shite but this thread is about them.
 
League position is a bit of saving grace for him at this point, they have 43 points from 25 games which over a 38 game season is 65 points. Considering they finished with 63 last season and were on a upwards curve at the end of the season I wonder if 65 would really be impressive especially if they finish 5/6th
 
Semper Fudge said:
I too ask silly questions when drunk.
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I think it’s a fair enough question to ask considering how well they finished last season and how popular he seemed to be with the players.
 
Raven said:
Would they have been better off keeping Poch?
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He wouldn't have accepted the transfer business the owners wanted to do. Maresca is a yes man which is why he got the job.
 
Maluco said:
I think it’s a fair enough question to ask considering how well they finished last season and how popular he seemed to be with the players.
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It's absolutely not a fair question; we didn't actually finish the season all that well but had a couple flukey results. Poch is a dinosaur of the modern game.
 
Is there a record for manager changeover in a ten year period. It’s like 1 a year
 
njred said:
Is there a record for manager changeover in a ten year period. It’s like 1 a year
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For permanent managers it’s been 7 in the last 10 years. I’m sure there are similar turnover rates at smaller club, I’m thinking teams like West Ham and Everton.. Closest I could find amongst the top 6 clubs is United at 4 and Tottenham at 5.
 
TheMagicFoolBus said:
It's absolutely not a fair question; we didn't actually finish the season all that well but had a couple flukey results. Poch is a dinosaur of the modern game.
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I don’t think that’s true at all, results were good and there were some very good performances and the players like him too.

If Maresca continues to get poor results, he has little credit in the bank. If he finishes outside the top 4 on this point trajectory, it’s a fair enough question.
 
Maluco said:
I don’t think that’s true at all, results were good and there were some very good performances and the players like him too.

If Maresca continues to get poor results, he has little credit in the bank. If he finishes outside the top 4 on this point trajectory, it’s a fair enough question.
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Results were only good on the surface if you ignore that we got smoked 5-0 by Arsenal and then drew 2-2 with Villa before our "good" period of 5 wins to close the season. And even then of those 5 wins, we were outplayed by Forest and Bournemouth pretty comprehensively.

This is to say nothing of the injury crisis Poch and his medieval training methods brought on - or the broader context wherein we conceded 63 goals, which was fecking ludicrous.
 
TheMagicFoolBus said:
Results were only good on the surface if you ignore that we got smoked 5-0 by Arsenal and then drew 2-2 with Villa before our "good" period of 5 wins to close the season. And even then of those 5 wins, we were outplayed by Forest and Bournemouth pretty comprehensively.

This is to say nothing of the injury crisis Poch and his medieval training methods brought on - or the broader context wherein we conceded 63 goals, which was fecking ludicrous.
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I don’t know. I think he was handed a tough deal at Chelsea. It was a tough situation to walk into and I think, by the end, he had finally organized things and gotten the players onside.

I don’t think it would have been the end of the world to give him another year with a settled squad.

Maresca had a great start, but it’s 2 wins in his last 9. If the next 9 are the same, it will be back to looking for someone in the summer.
 
Maluco said:
I don’t know. I think he was handed a tough deal at Chelsea. It was a tough situation to walk into and I think, by the end, he had finally organized things and gotten the players onside.

I don’t think it would have been the end of the world to give him another year with a settled squad.

Maresca had a great start, but it’s 2 wins in his last 9. If the next 9 are the same, it will be back to looking for someone in the summer.
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I probably came across as too abrasive initially in responding to you but with respect I would also suggest that I'm more plugged in with Chelsea than you are - so I feel quite comfortably saying that Poch's tactics were genuinely Neanderthal-level idiotic for the top level at this point.

I'm not going to try to argue that Maresca is the second coming at this point - but I feel very comfortably saying he's a miles better manager than Poch right now.
 
TheMagicFoolBus said:
I probably came across as too abrasive initially in responding to you but with respect I would also suggest that I'm more plugged in with Chelsea than you are - so I feel quite comfortably saying that Poch's tactics were genuinely Neanderthal-level idiotic for the top level at this point.

I'm not going to try to argue that Maresca is the second coming at this point - but I feel very comfortably saying he's a miles better manager than Poch right now.
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No problem, I respect your opinion and you could well be right, but Chelsea fans have been wrong about all things Chelsea many times before, so I think it’s a valid enough question. There is a bias there as a fan too, the hope will always be behind the new man…until it’s not. It’s easier to believe that the last manager was to blame (like we desperately want to believe about Ten Hag)

Poch is, for sure, a better man manager than Maresca, and I think we could be seeing the start of problems for him in that regard. I think the run of form is worrying.

At the end of the day, Maresca is inflexible with his philosophy, and once the results start going, it can be difficult to halt the slide. His CV and achievements are nowhere near what Pochettino achieved in the league. He would have to do a lot more to persuade me he was a better coach. One has many seasons to back that up, the other doesn’t.

In fact, I am prepared to stick my neck out a bit and say that I don’t think he will be at Chelsea come August.

Whether it would have been worth all that money to sack and hire different staff when there were signs it was coming together last season (despite a few lucky performances), is another question. But I think it’s a reasonable one.
 
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