Chelsea v Bournemouth: Tactical Review

5 Wins in a row to end the Season!

Chelsea lined up in their usual 4-2-3-1 formation with Silva playing his last game for the club, Chalobah and Sterling coming in for Gusto and Mudryk. Bournemouth made lots of changes and didn’t start with a recently injured but fit enough for the bench Solanke, who did not make the starting lineup against his former club.

Bournemouth started aggressively off the ball, pressing high in a 4-4-2, which they continued virtually all game. Kliuvert and Unal pressed Silva and Chalobah, Semenyo and Tavernier pressed Chelsea's FBs, while Christie and Cook were after Gallagher and Caicedo. Brighton's CBs were aggressive to follow Jackson and Palmer into midfield at times. It was hard for Chelsea to play through as much as they managed to at times.

Chelsea used their usual 3-2 build-up with Cucurella inverting into midfield to play out of the press. Bournemouth though were very aggressive still in the press, going man-to-man.

How did Bournemouth try to deal with inverting Cucurella? Semenyo was touch tight on Cucurella anytime he inverted into midfield as Bournemouth didn’t make it easy to play out of the press.

Chelsea, with the 4th best build-up in the Premier League according to Markstats.club, had the task of playing through the press, and they did so a lot of times especially in the first half, creating multiple transition opportunities. It’s the rotations that Chelsea create while building up that make it hard for Bournemouth to get the ball as well as they pressed.

Chelsea's main attacking threat against Bournemouth since they were facing a continuous press was to create chances though, playing out of the back like we’ve seen and transition opportunities. Trust Chelsea to create chances on the transition but our decision-making was atrocious and we missed the chance to create big chances.

Because of how high Bournemouth pressed, the space was there when Chelsea broke the press and also in behind Bournemouth as Chelsea took advantage of that as well.

Bournemouth tried to take advantage of the space in Chelsea's wide areas which as I've been saying all season is where to get space against Chelsea. They created chances through switches and trying to isolate Chelsea fullbacks 2v1.

Bournemouth were also a threat on the Counter as Chelsea's counter-press wasn't tight. Chelsea's CBs would have had to be more aggressive on Bournemouth’s attackers but weren’t the quickest to them at times. Counters generated the most amounts of shots for Bournemouth.

Bournemouth also tried to penetrate Chelsea's backline with passes in behind and get their 4 attackers picking up the loose balls, they ended up having lots of shots on goal from the way they attacked.

Bournemouth got a 2nd wind in the 2nd half and also tried the same thing of using the wide areas to put in dangerous crosses with Kerkez providing support to Semenyo especially when he was switched with Tarvenier on the wing. Bournemouth continued to overload Chelsea's Fullbacks. This would require Sterling and Noni to help by tracking back, but Sterling especially wasn’t effective in helping back.

Chelsea, however, added a 2nd goal after a sweeping passing move and a good 1v1 dribbling situation capitalised by Sterling.

Bournemouth were getting more joy from their pressing as it created chances for them as the 442 press was very aggressive on Chelsea.

Bournemouth still used the wide overloads to score their goal in the end. Kerkez this time inverted with Semenyo wide. In this situation, instead of Noni, it was meant to be Palmer who pressed. Noni jumped too early, destabilising the defensive shape and allowing an easy 2v1 against Chalobah and an uncontested cross for Unal, deception and goal.

Poch brought on Gusto at RM especially to change Chelsea to a back 5 when they defend, and attack as a RW in attack. This was similar to what he did against Forest and the early season with Chilwell. Gusto can then track the runs of Kerkez.

Chelsea's main source of chances in the 2nd half were transitions and exploiting Bournemouth's high line. Jackson got behind at different points, but better decision making and it would have been 3-1; those are the opportunities that never became one and wont show on the xG.

Bournemouth continued to cause danger and were unlucky not to get a draw with their threat on the counter attack after their wide threat was negated by Gusto's sub.

Chelsea held on until the end to confirm 5 wins in a row. A top end to the season despite it being a dodgy performance. It was important to round it off with a win for confidence to end the season with hope and ambition for a better next one.

Hello everyone, this was Seun with my final tactical review for the 2023/24 season. Signing off and thanking you all for following along this year!

Seun