Enzo Maresca: What the Data says

He's actually doing a good job & HAS improved Chelsea

There’s been a huge debate over Enzo Maresca for a while. I’ve never called for him to go though I’ve got close at times. I’ve always wanted it to work with him, and I still do.

Head coach Enzo Maresca has come under a lot of criticism. It seems like some fans are making it personal, which I never like in football, and he’s being blamed for literally everything, and people are getting way too emotional and illogical in their argument. Forming opinions based on raw emotion is a mistake I’ve made way too often, and I always regret it.

So how to assess him and how he’s doing without emotion? Well that’s easy, data.

Anyone who’s read my articles knows I’m a big fan of the use of data in football. Data is how Liverpool have got two PL titles, a CL, three domestic cups, a SuperCup and Club World Cup whilst only spending £800m in total, and £600m on their current squad.

All serious, ambitious clubs use data extensively in recruitment and squad building. Liverpool’s data bank is so good they actually can create data to show how managers are a cultural match for their club, which has helped them in recruiting the last two managers. And we’ve seen how that worked out.

When data doesn’t work at a club, it's because it's either bad data, or it's not being used or interpreted correctly. Which at our club, again, comes down to the Sporting Directors. I try and use reliable sources to get all my data, I want to use good data from good sources and use it properly. That’s what I’ve done with this article too, using official PL data from their website and other reliable sources.

So how well IS Maresca doing, according to the data?

Well, according to the PL’s own official stats, after 35 PL games Maresca has a higher win percentage than his predecessor Maurcio Pochettino, whose win percentage was 48%, with Enzo standing currently at 51%. In all competitions his win percentage is also higher than Pochettino’s 50%, currently standing at 59%.

Under Maresca in the PL we’ve conceded 41 goals in 35 games, 1.17 goals per game, as of time of writing, this is the joint third best in the PL with 3 games to go, on course for 44 goals conceded. Last season we conceded 1.65 goals per game in the PL, 63 goals in 38 games. So our defence has improved considerably, which is quite the achievement given the lack of quality in the goalkeeping department.

The defensive improvement, to me, is clearly due to the team structure Maresca has put in place, because we have two poor GK’s and not one real world class CB in their prime, Wesley Fofana, our best CB, has only played half a season. Last season we conceded 63 goals in the league with largely the same CBs, and we had no structure whatsoever. It was chaos, and unsustainable.

Now we have a proper tactical structure and our defence is a lot better. We’ve only conceded 5 PL goals in the last 9 PL games, and two of those to Ipswich. In the 8 games before we conceded 13 goals. In those 9 PL games we’ve only conceded 23 shots on target, around 2.5 per game.

The real test of this defence of course, began with Liverpool, the first top team we played in this run. Against Liverpool, we only allowed 2 shots on target in the entire game, whilst we had 7. So this is positive.

Our next 3 league games, Newcastle, Man Utd and Nottingham Forest will also be a test. If we can keep up the good defence in those games and score some goals, who knows what could happen.

Now, our attack. According to the PL official stats, this season under Enzo Maresca we’ve had the second highest shots on goal and big chances created in the in the PL with 3 games to go. We’ve had 568 shots, 16 shots per game, and 87 big chances (2.5 per game, which is actually very good). In both metrics, only champions Liverpool are ahead of us. Its no wonder Liverpool coach Arne Slot said he was surprised at our position in the league, because the data is very clear.

Our chance conversion rate is where it falls down, at only 8.9%, slightly lower than last season. It doesn’t take a genius to know has more to do with the lack of proper recruitment, including a proper 9 and other goalscoring attackers, rather than Maresca’s coaching.

Nicolas Jackson has had a two month injury and poor form, with no one to come in and replace him, Cole Palmer has been man marked with no alternative, had no rest, and lost a bit of confidence (up to Liverpool anyhow), and we’ve also played against way more low block since Christmas.

Some people also argue Enzo Maresca has not improved any players. But when I look especially at Enzo Fernandez, Moises Caicedo, and Marc Cucurella, that’s tough to believe.

Fernandez has had his best season yet and has 20 goal involvements, including 13 assists. Caicedo won the official Chelsea Men’s Player of the Year and Cucurella has been consistently excellent this year. Noni Madueke has also improved this season in my view, 11 goals and 5 assists already. Josh Acheampong has also developed and improved over the season.

Enzo Maresca has also given more academy debuts in a single season than any Chelsea manager in history. I believe this is a real positive for them and for the club, and in my view is a significant achievement given our history for blooding academy talents.

So overall under Enzo Maresca we have:

• Better defence

• Goalscoring the same / marginally worse

• More big chances created

• Higher win % in PL and all competitions

• Some players have improved

• Most academy debuts in a single season ever

I would argue also Enzo has had the exact same squad, or arguably a worse squad than we had last season, especially since Christmas. Palmer and Jackson have had no backup, and way more low blocks to play against since December than we did in the 18 months beforehand.

We’ve had no real backup in midfield, or any improvement in the goalkeeping department. Only one of our permanent signings last summer, Pedro Neto, makes it into our first choice XI, and even then that’s not 100% certain.

This all comes down to our Sporting Directors, Paul Winstanley and Laurence Stewart, and they are a huge reason why I’m hesitant to demand Maresca goes. Had they done their job and signed a top GK, a proven elite 9 who scored regularly, and maybe another goal scoring winger last summer, I suspect we’d have been in the title race for far longer and comfortably made the Champions League, with the same manager, same tactics, same set up. Cole Palmer could have been rested, and we’d have had more options.

All that said, Maresca has made mistakes.

The football has been absolutely dire at times, some team selections have been very odd, and Simon has reported some players aren’t enjoying the football. Not to mention some of Maresca’s ridiculous comments to the media. He’s not helped himself, comments which suggest low standards, criticising the fans, inconsistent comments, this is not good at all.

I was personally insulted by some of his comments blaming fans for the draw against Ipswich, and he annoyed me a lot. I put that largely down to his inexperience at this level, which isn’t his fault. Again, this is on the people above him who hired him, not Maresca himself.

On the other hand, many people have criticised him for his comments post game v Liverpool, but in my view that’s unfair, and the comments have been used selectively.

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“I promise you we didn't plan to play deep, we planned to play the other way that we usually do but we are happy we played good.

We planned to press, but sometimes you have to adapt”

• Enzo Maresca

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He did just say we didn’t play the way we wanted to play, he continued and then explained he and the team adapted to suit how Liverpool plays.

What he was doing was literally admitting publicly he adapted tactically to suit the opponent, which is what his critics have been asking him to do. But many people, largely thanks to how a certain BBC journalist shared the comments, read the first sentence without the context of the second. I’ll be honest I do think a section of fans have just decided on Maresca and are just looking for confirmation bias.

To be clear, I’m by no means saying we should definitely keep Enzo Maresca, though I admit the Liverpool result has swung me a little bit towards keeping him. The performances against Everton and Liverpool with his first choice XI were excellent, and we’re now likely to improve on our points tally from last year.

Add the squad issues, the positive data about our performances and the fact the people above him - the Sporting Directors - created this mess and should definitely go before the manager does, and it's tough for me to justify a decision to sack him. But, I think its wise to see how the last few games go before really coming to final opinion.

I’ll be brutally honest, I also don’t have the emotional energy or appetite for more drama and upheaval at the club, or to go on Twitter and campaign for a manager to be sacked to be honest.

We need some stability at Chelsea and we can’t keep starting over every year. One day we have to go through a phase like we did between January and April, and stick it out.

There is plenty of evidence that Maresca has improved our team overall given the context. I’d be fairly confident if we got a proper GK, top CB, proven goalscorer up front, more goals in our attack overall, and more quality depth in our squad, we’d do better next season and make the top 3 or 4 comfortably, even with Maresca in charge. Better competition in attack will also mean Cole Palmer has more space than he’s had this season, and likely score more freely.

If Maresca gets all this and then fails to achieve or we don’t improve, then he should definitely be replaced. But right now, and until the season is done, it's tough to make that argument, in my view.

The Score