Chelsea - Felipe Scolari brings samba to Stamford Bridge
The big man Felipe Scolari arrives at Stamford Bridge this week and who knows what he and Roman Abramovich have cooked up? First he inherits a good team, a team that missed out on winning the European Champions League by one penalty miss. A team that tracked a rampant and very fine Manchester United side to the last minutes of the 2007/8 season. However good or bad Avram Grant was as a manager, this team knows what to do. They still have it instilled in them from the Jose Mourinho era. A bit of man management to get the best out of one or two underperformers and they could be an outstanding team taking everything that moves. How quickly Scolari can get things moving is critical but the English players at least will be fresh from a summer by the pool. On the other hand knowing how capricious Abramovich could be the stable ship could be unsettled by multiple comings and goings just to please the owner who wants a new train set.
At the back they don’t have problems although the flying Portugese right back Jose Boswinga is a luxurious addition. Claude Makele’s age is not an issue with either Michael Essien or John Obe Mikel more than capable of being the enforcers. Indeed when Grant bought Nicolas Anelka in the transfer window many wonderered if he could even risk playing 4-2-4 with Drogba and Anelka up front, two wingers and the African hard men in the middle. It would have been brave, but it would have been electric football. The question is more to do with those wingers. In Mourinho’s first season it was Arjen Robben and Damien Duff, both now sold. Although they got good money for Robben to Real Madrid, as the Dutch found out in Euro 2008 he does not always turn up fit enough to play. But Florent Malouda was no substitute for them, Nor was Shaun Wright Phillips who flattered against the lesser teams and against the big teams just passed the ball straight back to the opponents. Joe Cole as other managers have noticed is not really a winger and has never quite found the best position for his talents.
Strangely in midfield Scolari could afford to let Frank Lampard go which would free up the shape of the team. In Michael Ballack he has a class operator going forward.
So does Scolari stick with what he has or twist on a few fancy purchases? By general assent there are too many players at Chelsea and some have to go. The big decision must be Didier Drogba who annoyed the faithful by getting sent off in the Champions League Final, but he is 30 and maybe only has one more year at the top level. Unfortunately for him the Milan rumours have it that Mourinho’s new Internazionale are well endowed with strikers where it is the other Milan club AC that need a strike force to team up with Kaka and the young Pato.
But there is another factor which in football terms runs deep. It was Lampard’s goals from midfield and Drogba’s explosiveness on which much of Chelsea’s success was based. Losing two such talismen sounds like a bad omen. Portsmouth are 8/1 to win at Stamford Bridge on the first day of the season. Stranger things have happened. Let the samba begin.
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