The pressure is beginning to crank up on the Italian coach, with his honeymoon period well and truly over at Stamford Bridge.
Chelsea’s season is in danger of unravelling; out of both domestic cup competitions and struggling for form in the league, Enzo Maresca’s honeymoon period as head coach
has come to an abrupt end. Their dire FA Cup exit at the hands of Brighton means the Conference League is now the Blues’ only realistic chance of silverware this season, and that is a trophy they have always been expected to win given the calibre of their rivals. Meanwhile, they are clinging on to their top-four place in the Premier League having been second a matter of weeks ago.
Perhaps for the first time amid a torrid run of form and poor results that stretches back to Christmas, Maresca finds himself under increasing external pressure, even if there are no signs the club is planning to take drastic action at this stage.
As we approach the final third of the Premier League campaign, the Italian tactician must find a way to stop Chelsea drifting and steer them back on course.
Cup failure
Chelsea are in the unfamiliar position of being out of both domestic cup competitions before February is out following their toothless defeat at Brighton in the fourth round of the FA Cup. In reality, that means they are looking at a ‘good’ season as the best-case scenario rather than a ‘great’ one, with the expectation at this stage that they should win the Conference League and cling on to a Champions League place.
A club that has made trophies its currency in the modern era, it will be mightily underwhelming for their followers that the Blues will not be making their near-customary Wembley appearance.
Even amid their tumultuous campaign under Mauricio Pochettino in 2023-24, they still reached an FA Cup semi-final and the final of the Carabao Cup, narrowly losing to Manchester City and Liverpool, respectively, while they were runners-up in both competitions two years before that under Thomas Tuchel.
Even when Chelsea aren’t favourites for a trophy, they so often find a way to be there right at the end, in with a chance of getting their hands on silverware. The fact that won’t be the case in the domestic cups this time around is a significant blow.
Alarming slump
The cup exit and nature of the defeat on the south coast adds to the sense that Chelsea’s season is drifting alarmingly; Maresca’s men have won just three of their last 10 games in all competitions stretching back to Christmas, with one of those victories coming over Morecambe, who sit right at the bottom of the Football League.
Any hope that this was just a blip has been extinguished, and what’s even more concerning is that it has been a long, long time since we’ve seen the Blues play with the kind of freedom that saw many pundits and rival fans label them title challengers before the festive period, and sections of the support are starting to lose patience.
Following the loss at Brighton, a concerning statistic circulated among the fanbase on social media that reflected the dramatic downturn: if you disregard the Conference League – where Chelsea are obvious favourites with a squad value that dwarfs their rivals – Maresca’s win percentage (50%) is now worse than Pochettino’s when he left the role in the summer (51%).
Strangely, the current incumbent and his predecessor are having opposing seasons so far, with Pochettino starting terribly – Chelsea were 10th at this stage last season – before finishing the campaign very strongly, while Maresca’s side have slumped after a fine start to 2024-25.
‘We need to learn’
The fact Chelsea are still fourth is testament to their overall improvement throughout 2024, but the Italian tactician has to arrest this slide in the coming weeks – especially with Manchester City, Newcastle and Bournemouth all within touching distance, and Nottingham Forest consolidating third place above them.
For his part, Maresca has maintained that he believes Chelsea are ahead of schedule, claiming recently that he still feels his side has been “very, very good” to this point, but surely that cannot be the message he has relayed to his players lately. Instead, the head coach believes game management is the root cause of their recent problems.
“We need to learn how to win games 1-0,” he insisted over the weekend. “I said many times. In the same way, in the last game against West Ham we were losing but in the end we won 2-1.
“That is part of the season, part of football, sometimes you are down and win and sometimes it happens like tonight. But I said already to the players weeks ago that as a team we need to learn to win games 1-0. That is what big teams do.”
Maresca isn’t wrong, but in the depths of a run of just two wins in eight Premier League games that has involved some pretty dire performances, Chelsea supporters would be happy to see their team taste victory by any means possible to battle their way out of this rut.
Chance to turn it around
For optimistic Chelsea followers, there is light at the end of the tunnel. Although many would argue they should have picked up plenty of points across the winter given a relatively kind schedule, their upcoming fixture list offers the Blues a chance to right some wrongs.
They will surely be out for revenge when they return to Brighton on Friday, and although a trip to Villa Park looks daunting later in February, the west Londoners have largely had the better of Unai Emery’s team in recent times and have the ability to claim a statement victory.
If they can eke at least four points points from those games, their subsequent two matches come at home to relegation-battling Southampton and Leicester, and six points would set them up nicely for a blockbuster trip to Arsenal in mid-March. Of course, there are plenty of variables, but Chelsea can look at this period as an opportunity to get their season back on track.
The new standard?
It has been telling that throughout this downturn there have not been the murmurs of discontent from behind the scenes that we have come to associate with a Chelsea manager’s final weeks in charge.
Perhaps the club’s days of ruthless hiring and firing – continued by the BlueCo ownership in the post-Roman Abramovich era – genuinely are behind them as they desperately seek some stability after a tumultuous few years.
The supporters are accustomed to short-term success in the form of trophies, even when the going is tough, but those in charge at the club clearly believe this season was a necessary stepping stone to longer-term, consistent prosperity, and perhaps Maresca really is going to be given more time than his predecessors were afforded.
Speaking after the FA Cup exit, the head coach continued to take a longer view, saying: “If there is something positive it is that we can be focused on the Premier League and Conference [League], especially in the Premier League. For me, a good season is seeing the team improving game after game; go through bad moments through difficulty – it is the only thing I think that can bring this club to compete for something important. This is exactly what I think.”
Long-term aim the same
There is no doubt that Chelsea overachieved in the first half of the season, and that probably hasn’t helped morale among supporters with recent results bringing them back down to earth as any semblance of a title challenge disintegrated. Nevertheless, the club’s long-term goals remain the same and the Blues are still technically on course to surpass internal expectations in Maresca’s debut season.
Speaking last month, he said: “The schedule [decided with the hierarchy] was, second season go for top four and then after the second season, try to compete for a title. This is also the reason why I have said many times that we are ahead of my expectations because we spend almost all season in the top four. This shows how ahead we are in terms of expectations.”
However, that doesn’t excuse Chelsea’s season unravelling from this point onwards and will not appease a demanding fanbase if things do not improve; we have seen that this squad is capable of more than just a top-six finish, and now it’s up to Maresca to get the best out of a hugely talented group once again.
