The Pochettino Conundrum

He still has it all to prove & concerns are still valid, despite the Spurs win

I have to admit, I’ve never felt as conflicted on a Chelsea manager as I have with Mauricio Pochettino.

Last week when we were humiliated by Arsenal, with an absolutely embarrassing, shameful performance, I wanted him gone immediately, or at least in the summer. It was just beyond the pale, and as much his responsibility as the players.

Then we put in a performance like the one against Spurs and Villa, with solid tactical organisation, good defensive structure, and a solid performance with goals, and v Spurs, a clean sheet. Then suddenly it doesn’t feel so bad.

However, there’s a lot of serious concerns I still have about Pochettino, and one positive result should not wash those all away. I was, and am still, sick of the “chaos” football with no tactical structure whatsoever, no defensive organisation, just leaving ourselves wide open and hoping Cole Palmer wins the game. It was like this for months and months. No patterns of play, no style of play developing, no idea what Poch was trying to achieve, players left out to dry. It felt like some players had even regressed.

Then there was Poch’s record of rushing players back from injury to his harsh training methods, causing many players to get re-injured or injured in training. By no means had he caused all our injuries, but his training methods and rushing players back, which he has a record for, had played a significant part in many.

Finally, there’s the numerous patronising and disrespectful comments towards Chelsea fans. Mocking fans who were saying he didn’t know what he was doing whilst 11th in the table. Insulting fans' intelligence on numerous occasions, such as the issue with injuries, which is a science based argument, not a twitter rage concept, and also on saying he had no midfielders, when he had academy players on the bench he could use. The constant lowering of expectations and taking no responsibility for his constant mistakes and poor in game management adds to this.

Many of these are still valid issues and concerns. One good result and performance against Spurs, for which Pochettino does deserve huge credit, doesn’t negate them all. They all need to be seriously addressed for us to progress as a club.

I think I now appreciate why the ownership want to wait till the summer to make a decision. They don’t want to make a decision emotionally or be reactionary, based on one or two good results. They want to objectively analyse the whole season, the data on player and team performance and improvement, the results, where we finish, expectations for next year, relationship/connection with the fans, fan views, and take an unbiased decision objectively. I respect that.

Because objectively, there are positives from this season too. There’s clear improvement from last season. Here’s some stats:

• We’ve scored 65 goals in the PL and 91 goals in 46 games in all competitions. We scored 38 goals in 38 PL games, and 50 goals in 50 games in all comps last season.

• We’re on course to get between 58-63 points this season, both of which are significantly more than our 44 points of last season.

• The above is despite having 57 injuries (and counting), and 3 key players - Christopher Nknuku, Reece James and Wesley Fofana - essentially missing all season, with Romeo Lavia also out all season, the likes of Levi Colwill and Trevoh Chalobah also missing a lot of games, and Enzo Fernandez playing at least a third or even half a season carrying an injury and needing injections. I think it's reasonable to assume had most of those players been fully fit for most of the season, we’d have about 8-12 more points, and be comfortably in 5th and even pushing for 4th. Which suggests if they’re fit for more of next season and we make the right additions, we’ve a good chance of challenging for a Champions League place next year.

• There’s clearly a strong collective unit, a team spirit, and a unity in the camp. The atmosphere seems to be pretty good as well, and the players are fully behind their manager and have often come out to support him publicly, even after a 5-0 defeat when they took responsibility publicly. That’s rare at Chelsea especially, and is a huge positive overall.

• Pochettino’s record against top teams is fairly good. Against City, Arsenal, Spurs, Liverpool, Aston Villa, Man Utd and Newcastle, we’ve only lost once at home in 8 games In all competitions, winning 4 times, and deserving to win at home to Arsenal and arguably against City too. Last season, in all comps, we played 14 games against these teams, losing 9, drawing 4 and winning only 1.

• We’re 6th in the PL form table for the last 6 games, 7th for the last 10 games, which is improved from the first half of the season (we were 10th/11th around December).

• Our form and consistency has improved dramatically since Christmas. At Christmas, after 18 PL games, we were 10th in the league with 22 points. Since Christmas we’re 5th in the PL form table, with 29 points, level on points with Villa. Only 3 teams - Man City, Arsenal and Liverpool - have more PL points than us since Christmas (17 games, so nearly half a season), with Villa getting the exact same. We’ve also only lost 4 PL games in that time, winning 8 and drawing 5. That’s 1.7 points per game, around 65 points in a 38 game season, with 3 key players missing completely and multiple others missing for long periods.

When you look at this evidence, you can’t argue we’ve not improved under Pochettino, in particular over the second half of the season. He deserves a lot of credit for that, and should rightly be praised for that improvement.

The other issue of course, is finding a suitable alternative who would be a valid upgrade on Pochettino. Xabi Alonso is staying where he is, Ruben Amorim recently reaffirmed his commitment to Sporting Lisbon - though personally I still think he could be prised away this summer, he’s known to be desperate for a PL move.

Roberto De Zerbi seems ever more likely to stay at Brighton, and for me wouldn’t be an upgrade anyway. Sebastian HoeneB has signed a new deal as has Julian Nagelsmann. The owners will never go for Thomas Tuchel (who would come back allegedly), Jose Mourinho or Antonio Conte (and they shouldn’t in Conte’s case, for me). If you count all those out, the field is pretty bare, apart from Hansi Flick.

For me you only make a change if you know you can get someone who is a genuine upgrade, who will improve the team, improve results, win over the players and is a better coach overall.

However, for me, the concerns about Pochettino are still just as valid, and remain very clear. The emotion of a good win doesn’t change these serious concerns one bit, and the owners should know this. These issues must be addressed seriously and urgently.

He has to make more of an effort to connect with fans, go to fans after games home and away, acknowledge their support, be more respectful of fans in his comments. This is non-negotiable if he wants to succeed.

He also needs to take responsibility when he makes bad decisions, not make pathetic excuses and blame others. Then, Poch needs to set long term expectations properly - to win trophies - and never be content with failure.

He absolutely must give us a consistently strong tactical structure and defensive organisation. Chaos ball cannot return and should not be seen ever again, because it doesn’t work and isn’t sustainable, and is frankly just poor coaching which makes players worse. He has to get the best out of his best players and use them properly. We have to see a clear style of play developing, clear patterns of play and more consistency.

Results and performances like the Arsenal game cannot happen ever again, simple as that. It’s not acceptable at Chelsea Football Club, ever. Another performance and result like that is a sackable offence. Frankly, he’s lucky that one didn’t cost him his job.

Pochettino has until the end of the season to earn my (and others) support for another season. If we continue to show the same clear tactical and defensive structure and organisation we’ve seen in the last two games, keep more clean sheets, keep improving and progressing, and win all our games until the end of the season, we could finish 6th, and if all those things happen, he’ll have a earned a chance to keep his job and get more backing for next year.

If not, we see chaos ball return, lose one or two of our final games, and end up scraping 7th or 8th, then there would serious concerns for me about whether Poch should stay.

Pochettino’s future really does depend on the results and performances in these last 4 games. I’m not wedded to any outcome, I just want what’s best for Chelsea FC, like we all do.

I want a manager I can trust and fully get behind completely, emotionally and positively, who gives me confidence. Pochettino still hasn’t earned that trust or confidence for me. Its’ up to him whether he can or not.

Let’s see what happens.

The Score