Chelsea supporters were eager to watch their newly-redesigned team play during the international break, and their disappointment was short-lived as they were disappointed by the team’s return to league action last week against Bournemouth.
Chelsea enjoyed one of their final free midweeks until about April, while several other teams played this week.
In a lengthy and fascinating interview, the club took advantage of the opportunity to talk to Enzo Maresca about his tenure thus far. He stated that his team is faring better than he had anticipated:
To be honest, we are ahead of my expectations. The players have been open-minded and absorbing all of the information since I started, the coach stated, and we believe that’s important.
We’ve already applied four or five different forms of pressure off the ball. On the ball, we try to find an alternative answer, so it depends on how the opposition defends. We played one way against Crystal Palace and another against Inter Milan in the friendly match, and we played a different manner against the rest.
“We attempt to adjust to the opposition’s attacking and defensive strategies and game-planning techniques.”
Hands-on, Enzo Maresca has more Pep than Carlo.
This circumstance may be somewhat comparable to the well-known incident that occurred at Bayern Munich in the middle of the decade. Carlo Ancelotti replaced Pep Guardiola when he left, but Ancelotti’s laissez-faire approach to training and management in general, while ideal for Real Madrid and some other teams, didn’t mesh well with Bayern’s precise Bavarian machinery and appeared especially careless coming after Guardiola’s obsessive reign.
The players may be appreciating the new level of detail from the Italian now that Maresca, a lot more hands-on and switched-on player, has taken over from Pochettino, the “vibes man.”