bridge views - the thinking fan's chelsea blog

A bridgeviews.co.uk break

All good things come to and end...or at least a temporary break. Regular visitors to the blog will know that posting has been sporadic for a while. Cruel fate has conspired against me, and finding the time needed to do the site justice just isn't as easy as it used to be. 

Anyway, I hope to bring bridgeviews.co.uk back one day. In the meantime, I'll be spending much more time over on my Twitter feed. Look forward to talking to you over there.

Thanks for visiting, and enjoy the football.  

Manager or head coach model? Ancelotti might not be on to a loser at Chelsea

This weekend, Carlo Ancelotti compared his role at Chelsea to that of Ferguson at Man Utd, claiming his role was technical only: he is not the ‘manager’. This has helped kick-start the debate we love so much: should all power be placed in the hands of the manager, or can a more ‘continental’ approach do the job?

In England, the idea of a ‘head coach’ (rather than a manager) system tends to be viewed in the same terms as ditching sterling for the Euro, drinking tea without milk or wearing a hat indoors: unpalatable. Fans, the media and indeed managers in the game tend to cling onto the idea of the traditional English football manager – someone who has ultimate control at the club, from training sessions and nutrition regimes through to player wages and transfers.

Talk on Chelsea chat forums in response to Ancelotti’s comments bears this out: never is anger directed at Abramovich (the man solely responsible for Chelsea moving into the upper echelons of world football) as much as when it is perceived that he has ‘interfered’.

The continuing success of Alex Ferguson, of course, helps to perpetuate the idea that his is the ideal model for achieving success in football. Ferguson, we’re told, has his fingers in all the pies at Man Utd, and has succeeded for twenty years. Surely this is the only recipe for success? Some pundits would have us believe it.

This model has of course worked at other clubs, and certainly still practiced (most commonly at smaller teams). It has worked in other sports too: Clive Woodward, for example, was massively hands-on during his time with the England rugby team, micro-managing every conceivable aspect of squad life.

In contrast, the model of management seen typically as continental European, where the manager’s role is more akin to being a head coach and other figures have a greater influence on club finance and transfer policy, is viewed with deep suspicion and distrust on this side of the channel. As foreign influences on the Premier League – predominantly in the form of owners from overseas – have grown over the last decade, the ‘Director of Football’ has become the focal point for the almost xenophobic assumption that draining of power away from the manager is always a destructive thing.

Looking at this rationally however, the old-school British idea of the god-like football manager is surely well past its sell by date. This is an idea that dates back way past the establishment of the Premier League, when football was an altogether different business. Before the explosion of football in the 80s and 90s, squads were half the size and players were paid £200 a month. It certainly wasn’t an ‘international’ game in the same way, and wasn’t nearly so commercialised.

Against that backdrop, it was far more plausible – and sensible – that one manager co-ordinated everything at a club. The best managers were tacticians and motivators, but were also organisers, pulling together plans for everything from formations to away fixture travel arrangements.

Now, Premier League football teams are commercially geared, multi-national organisations with multi-million pound turnovers. They have squads at every age group and draw on the talents of hundreds of employees. The stakes, too, are much higher: arguably lack of success on the pitch has never come at such a high price in the history of the game.

With all that in mind, having one all-knowing manager co-ordinate all aspects of a club’s activity isn’t really credible or sustainable. The so-called continental model of having a Director of Football figure acting as a make-weight between the ‘manager’ and a club’s hierarchy – a figure who can blend technical with business understanding – isn’t such a ludicrous proposition. Naturally it’s horses for courses but, for some clubs, a system that balances power slightly upwards and away from the manager is perfect, as demonstrated by some of Europe’s most successful clubs for decades.

The key thing here, of course, is the balance. Even under such a system, the manager should be the most important person at the football club, given the freedom to develop and execute a vision for the team. A big part of that should be the hierarchy empowering him to deliver on that vision, providing a kind of ‘sense check’ from both a sporting and business perspective and constructing the parameters within which he should work.

And this is where it’s going wrong at Chelsea: that balance hasn’t been correctly struck. That Ancelotti can’t select his right-hand man or, as we are led to believe, isn’t consulted on who that person should be, is just one piece of evidence that suggests the freedom to build on his vision is constricting.

So the system isn’t necessarily a bad one – it can work and we shouldn’t attack it purely out of some old-fashioned notion of how things should be or, worse, how things were done. Chelsea’s problem seems to be that there are too many competing, self-interested visions for the club at its upper reaches that muddy the water. The balance needs to be redressed, and Ancelotti has a job on his hands.

Ancelotti gossip: there's no smoke without fire at Chelsea

Another weekend, another loss. Three weekends in a row, now: is losing becoming a habit for the champions? Well, no. But things aren’t pretty on the pitch at the moment.

Off the pitch however, things are probably worse. Just as Chelsea seemed to be throwing a past of almost continual behind-the-scenes turmoil behind them, Ray Wilkins’ departure chucked a large, slightly rusting spanner in the Cobham works. Then the promotion of little-known Nigerian, Michael Emenalo, to the vacant position raised more eyebrows and further increased speculation that Abramovich was personally ringing the changes.

Ancelotti, of course, came out of all this looking like an increasingly powerless pawn in the Chelsea machine, and his comments over the weekend that he is nothing more than a ‘technician’ certainly fed into that. Rightly or wrongly, the media interpreted this as the frustration from a manager nearing the last straw.

On Sunday evening, rumours that Ancelotti had offered his resignation (rumours I first read on twitter) started flying around the internet, and bookies were inundated with bets that he would be the next manager – sorry technician – out of the door. All of this morning’s national newspapers carried the same story: Ancelotti’s days were numbered.

Chelsea have moved to dismiss the stories as mere newspaper gossip but, whilst papers are certainly prone to embellishment or the odd piece of fiction, this amount of smoke very rarely comes without a fire burning somewhere. It seems incredible to think that, just months after a historic double, and only weeks after Chelsea were being declared almost unbeatable, the manager could be close to the exit door.

We certainly only know a fraction of what is really going on, but don’t be surprised if it happens – either now or at the end of the season.

Chelsea: don't believe the hype

Part of the price ‘big clubs’ pay for their status is greater scrutiny of every win, loss, piece of individual genius and mistake.

Up until recently, Chelsea experienced a very specific type of scrutiny. A huge 2010 saw Chelsea not only win the double, but also become utterly ruthless in front of goal. A high scoring second half of 2009/10 continued into August.

Chelsea started getting uncommon praise from all comers: Ancelotti had added style to the substance. Chelsea could pass it like Arsenal, score more than Utd and rack up more points than anyone along the way. The squabbling and turmoil that had become the norm at Chelsea disappeared, and journalists discovered Chelsea as their new second favourite team. Chelsea had cut its mammoth and expensive squad to size but were even better than last season. Winning the league at a canter was a certainty, and younger players were finally getting their chance. Alex gave an interview in the Chelsea magazine saying the team played like Brazil.

Rumours that Chelsea were considering a big money move to a new stadium at Earl’s Court only fed a general belief that Chelsea were once again on an relentless forward march.

Us fans? Well we probably bought into the hype a little bit too. I think Chelsea fans, unlike maybe Utd supporters, still harbour a fundamental pessimism on the whole: we don’t typically consider ourselves heirs to every trophy or assume success. But, almost like never before, I reckon crowds at the Bridge started to expect big wins every time they turned up.

Even the disappointment at Eastlands didn’t dampen spirits. Man City played a negative game, Chelsea didn’t really turn up and Tevez did what he has it in him to do: win a game on his own. It wasn’t a fluke, but these things happen.

But the tide started to turn after the Liverpool match, with fans bemoaning a slothful first half showing and pretty much everyone picking up on some very inconsistent away form. Then, last week against Sunderland, a mauling reversed opinion entirely.

Now the hype has lurched from one extreme to another. Chelsea’s wheels are either falling off or, having fallen off somewhere between Liverpool and West London on 7^th November, are lying splintered in a roadside ditch somewhere between Birmingham and Watford. A very real injury crisis is fuelling a general expectation that the attempt to recover those wheels is doomed to failure.

Talk now isn’t of Ancelotti’s genius at having dominated the league, bringing youth through and cutting the wage bill. What was once a virtue is now a sin: the media – and fans - now attack the club for not spending money in the summer. Why wasn’t Carvalho replaced? Why was a recognised forward bought to supplement – or ultimately replace - Drogba or Anelka? Perhaps the ludicrous transfer gossip they spewed all over their back pages throughout the summer was less journalist gossip to sell papers, and more the media helpfully putting forward a strategic proposition to Abramovich and Gourlay.

And, as if on-the pitch issues weren’t enough, Ray Wilkins’ controversial departure fuelled a very Chelsea-like sense of behind-the-scenes turmoil (no crisis at this club would be complete without it), and Drogba’s malaria added to the sense of ludicrous melodrama that seems to follow Chelsea in its darker days.

The truth, of course, is that neither sets of hype should be believed. Chelsea were in a rich vein of form, but that did not make them Brazil or Barcelona. The club is in a bit of a mess at the moment, but that doesn’t make them Bolton or Blackburn (or Liverpool). Injured players will return, results will improve – there’s too much talent in the squad for that not to happen.

Winning the league isn’t a foregone conclusion – but it never was. But neither the loss at Anfield or to Sunderland was terminal. More draws and losses will certainly follow, and probably in December – but that’s the nature of the beast.

I’m as pessimistic as the next fan (actually, more so) but this time, despite the obvious issues Carlo is undeniably facing, I’m preaching patience. Today, at least…

England lose: but surely Chelsea must be to blame somehow?

England’s fortunate 2-1 loss to a rejuvenated French side last night saw another file added to the international side’s library of underwhelming performances. The collection has started to overflow of late.

But it’s all a bit confusing. Normally when England disappoint it’s because John Terry has sown disharmony throughout the squad (through any number of tried and tested egotistical tactics) or is an over-rated Sunday league footballer. Alternatively, it’s because Frank Lampard is an average and slightly overweight footballer with a propensity to miss the target (20 international goals notwithstanding). Sometimes defeat has even been because Ashley Cole is an unreliable, conniving and money-grabbing love rat.

England fans leaving the stadium yesterday must have stared blankly at each other, queuing silently and solemnly as they meandered up towards Wembley Park tube to make their way home. With none of the devil’s own footballers on the pitch, for what possible reason can mighty England have succumbed to the old enemy, pretty much the only team to have put in a more under-par performance in South Africa?

It’s too much to hope for that Terry, Lampard and Cole will have been missed by England fans, but maybe it will beg the question elsewhere. Most likely they will be missed by other members of the squad, who suddenly found themselves the target of the England boo-boys due to the normal candidates being unavailable.

I write this post mostly in jest of course. Regardless however, perhaps it will sink it that England has no god-given right to be good at football. Whether or not Capello is worth £6m a year is another debate (I can’t point to much he’s done right over the last six months), but the simple truth is that he can only work with what he’s given. Chelsea players or no, he hasn’t got much to work with.

You might also like to read:

• Some thoughts on how England could spend Capello’s wages

No excuses for Chelsea's insipid Sunderland battering

Like last Monday, today’s journey into work took an unfamiliar feel. Same bus, same journey, same dreary monotony…save one detail. Normally my morning routine involves catching up with the latest football headlines on Sky Sports News, before casting my eyes over the online news on the bus.

Not today, not last week. Two terrible Chelsea Sunday performances have seen me, ostrich-like, bury my head in the sporting sand.

This time though, I’ll emerge to post my thoughts on the game. First thing’s first: Sunderland were excellent. Many teams have come to Stamford Bridge in recent months, caught Chelsea in something less than top form, and still left with nothing. Steve Bruce’s team certainly caught Chelsea below par, but tore through them relentlessly to record a well deserved victory. As Chelsea fans streamed from the stadium five minutes from time, the away support jeered: ‘easy, easy, easy’. Easy it certainly was: in many ways, 3-0 flattered Chelsea.

Sunderland fans might not agree however, but I think that, if Chelsea had turned in anything resembling a competent performance, the result would have been different. Bewildered Chelsea fans trudging out of the Britannia gate were left to speculate how a team fielding five players bought for more than £15m could have turned in such an average performance.

There are, of course, excuses that fans and Chelsea staff alike might look to. Injuries, of course, being the primary one. Yesterday’s was a team deprived of Alex, Terry, Essien and Lampard: four experienced and probably world class players who would walk into every team in the Premier League. The defence was a pale imitation of what it might have been and conceding was probably inevitable. No-one mentions Benayoun in the list of players missing yesterday (probably because his is such a long-term injury), but my feeling is that the Israeli might have played a key role yesterday, stitching together an otherwise rudderless display.

But whilst Chelsea’s bench might have been vacant of established talent, the first XI still possessed enough quality to deliver a better showing. Zhirkov and Ramires looked nothing like £36m worth of footballer. The Russian actually looked pretty good going forward, single-handedly carving out Chelsea’s best chance in the first half, but is probably too lightweight to play such a pivotal central midfield role when not supplemented by an Essien or a Lampard.

The less said about Ramires the better, at the moment. Clearly not yet ready for the Premier League, a few good tackles yesterday did not distract from a display that saw him continuously get brushed off the ball. Yes, he needs to be given time to get up to speed, but he also needs to find a way to contribute more in the interim. Getting the basics right would be a good start.

The other excuse Chelsea fans might be looking to could be last week’s departure of Ray Wilkins. We will probably never know the full and precise extent of the fallout of his departure, much less why he was got rid of in the first place. There must be more to it but, either way, Wilkins’ departure surely doesn’t constitute enough of an explanation. In any case, in my view yesterday’s showing was merely an extension of previous form for which, presumably, Wilkins was in part responsible for.

Realistically, the game was lost because too many senior players didn’t play to potential. Chelsea haven’t really played well since the first half against Blackpool back in mid September, but have racked up points because our special players have been able to produce something. When the whole team’s form drops off a cliff – with the exception of Cech and Mikel – chances are losses won’t be far away.

This was an insipid, inspiration-less Chelsea, reminiscent of the worst performances under Scolari two years ago. We are nowhere near those darker days, of course, still sitting a relatively healthy two points clear at the top of the Premier League. But worrying signs are there, and Ancelotti has his work cut out to get his side’s form back on track. Inspiration is his job.