Why Mauricio Pochettino's track record justifies patience
He's got a record of starting slowly at PL clubs...before sharp improvements (Article by The Score)
Genuinely one of the most ridiculous (and that’s being polite) patterns I’ve seen on Chelsea twitter in the last few weeks is Chelsea fans starting to campaign for the removal of head coach Mauricio Pochettino.
After a total of 6 games in all competitions.
I really don’t have polite words for this, so I’ll hold fire on my real feelings on that opinion and those who hold it.
Chelsea fans are so conditioned to instant impact and any bad run of form costing a manager their job, and into scapegoating managers for everything, they almost know no different.
As I wrote in a previous article, Pochettino has been severely handicapped by near enough half his first team squad being injured, including several key players. He also has a group of young players only brought together this summer.
But someone mentioned, Pochettino has a history of starting slowly in the Premier League, so I looked at the data. It was revealing.
At Southampton he took over after game-week 22, of the 12/13 PL season and in his first 16 PL games, to the end of the 12/13 season, his record was:
Won: 4
Drawn: 7
Lost: 5
PL points: 19
At Spurs his record in his first 16 PL games starting on match-day one of the 14/15 PL season (when unlike us, he had a goalscorer in Harry Kane) was:
Won: 7
Drawn: 3
Lost: 6
PL points: 24
His record after these initial 16 games generally improved, with Southampton going on to finish 8th in his only full season, which ultimately landed him the Spurs job. At Spurs, he got 40 league points in the following 22 PL games that 13/14 season (including beating the eventual champions Chelsea 5-3), which ultimately took them to a 5th placed finish and the league cup final that season.
What’s interesting about Spurs is he also had a good pre-season in his first season, before that difficult spell - much like he’s experienced at Chelsea.
There’s a very clear pattern here. Despite what many think, Pochettino has a very specific coaching philosophy, rooted in the teachings of Marco Bielsa, his friend and mentor, but which has also adapted and grown with time. It requires incredible levels of fitness, it has patterns and automations, and a clear structure - so it takes time to learn it. Due to the fitness levels required, players often get injuries early on as their bodies adapt to it, which might explain at least some of our recent injuries.
Obviously, it takes players a few months to adapt to his system and way of playing, and for it to become muscle memory rather than conscious thinking.
When you combine this with a squad decimated by injury, lacking key players, and an average age of 22.5, you can see immediately why we’re having short term problems (and they are short-term problems, without any question).
The flip side to the difficult start, is that once a team has adapted to Pochettino’s philosophy, they play quick, intense, energetic attacking football, with a strong defence, creating a lot of chances, usually scoring goals, and finding more consistency. In fact, his teams often overachieve related to their quality.
One look at the line up above (thanks to Felix Johnston for the graphic) shows just how much quality we are missing, with the likes of Christopher Nkunku, Reece James, Benoit Badiashile, Moises Caicedo all certain starters and improvements for example. You could also factor in Armando Broja’s imminent return in attack as a potential sign of hope too, due to his goalscoring ability. So despite everything, there’s plenty of reasons to be optimistic.
The players will improve, the performances will improve and as we get our full squad together, there’s no question we’ll have a competitive team.
Chelsea fans are used to quick fixes, but if you want to build and develop a team for the long term, as we do, that method won’t work. The long term is the way we are building, the rewards could be great.
We need to back our manager, because his track record, at small and big clubs, with lesser and elite players, proves he can cope with the pressure of poor form, and still deliver.
The Score
Don't hold fire, Si, let it rip. I really hate the seemingly growing contingent of Chelsea 'fans' (I don't believe they are true fans, just X merchants), that just make radical claims for clickbait and false agendas. Anyone that thinks Poch should be sacked needs to seek urgent medical attention.
good article. And again i will say this that Poch is not a problem ... he is a solution to our problems but he has been dealt a very difficult hand by our owners / directors by handing him so many project players when he himself asked for experience.
Experience does not mean signing 29-30 yr olds .. though even that can be looked at if an opportunity presents itself (say someone good is out of contract or has a low release clause). Its great to sign young players but you need the experienced heads to guide them, hold their hand when the chips are down and power through crises.
We could have done so much better with the money we spent. We really needed to target players in the Nkunku / Badiashile mould... who are young and still have alot of senior minutes. So think Leao, Rice, Osimhen, Maignan / Martinez. That would have been some spine and would have cost us at max 500m.
Yet we went for project players or players we simply didnt need (Mudryk, Lavia, Sanchez, Palmer). That's close to 200m saved right there and had they properly thought about this project they would have been able to convince Rice long time back so Caicedo's fee could have been diverted to Rice.
Anyways it is what it is. Have to grind it out one way or the other.
Only thing is that if things continue to slip i can see the fan anger in the stands being directed towards the ownership too... sooner or later they will realise that manager is not the problem