Player unrest = Over-sized squad
It's clear to see reports of player unrest are merely from those players not playing, and that's on the board.
Chelsea manager Frank Lampard is under scrutiny right now as reports stay rife of his job at the club becoming under threat after the defeat to Manchester City on Sunday.
The Blues legend is not immune from criticism, and people are right to question his work as manager this season.
However, there are certain things that have hindered the season for Lampard that has been out of his hands entirely, and it is important to remember this when making your own assessments and reading the various reports of player unrest.
The claims are that Lampard has lost the faith of some of his players, thus causing player unrest amongst the group.
Whilst largely this is true, it is a different story when you realise the players who are annoyed.
It is not the youngsters who Lampard has given chances to, more chances than any other manager has given young players at the club for many years now.
Pure and simply, the unhappy players are those who are not playing under Lampard, naturally.
Your Marcos Alonso’s, Antonio Rudiger’s, Fikayo Tomori’s, Emerson Palmieri’s, Kepa Arrizabalaga’s etc. These are the players who want to be playing, but are not playing. So shock horror, they are annoyed by this, thus creating a ‘Lampard losing the dressing room’ scenario.
The truth is that many of the players are backing Lampard and are thankful for the chances and opportunities he has given them, but you cannot please everyone with such a massive squad, and this is on the board.
We started this season with three left backs who would consider themselves regular starters, and five centre backs with the same thought process.
We only play one left back a match, and two centre backs; even if we rotate often you are always going to have unhappy players.
The board should have sorted loan deals at the very least for the likes of Alonso, Rudiger etc during the summer, and not decided to wait until the following transfer window or two in the hope of getting more money and more suitors for them. Because that has backfired immensely and just created an atmosphere surrounding those players, and perhaps one of two of them who have close relationships with those players.
It was a time bomb waiting to explode, and now it is just one of many issues building up against Lampard.