21Feb

AVB’s future at Chelsea: Time is key

by kieran makwana

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Over the last few weeks André Villas-Boas has been under huge amounts of pressure as Chelsea manager and deservedly so. Poor results recently culminating in the 1-1 FA Cup draw with Birmingham have seen the game against Napoli as make or break. AVB may talk about a long-term project, however, with the previous record of Roman Abramovich, keeping his job is all but certain if he fails to get any kind of result in Naples. But, with an ageing and underperforming squad the question of whose fault the decline is has to be raised. Are the players egos and their age getting in the way? Or is it a case of a manager who makes basic errors in key games?

At the moment it seems to be more a case of the latter, however, there are big players who are doing poorly: Torres, Meireles, Lampard, Ashley Cole, all players who have underperformed to the ability that they are capable of. Meireles, for example, is a player who looked to be an attacking force during certain parts of last season with Liverpool but now he looks a shadow of his Liverpool self, the same can obviously be said for Fernando Torres. It is clear he hasn’t been as good as he used to be but is this down to solely him or the service he is getting and the formation employed? Surely that is the manager’s job, to employ a system which would ensure the best is being got from Torres. However, he simply doesn’t have the personnel, using two unnatural wingers in Mata and Sturridge as well as no creative force in midfield has meant a stagnation of play. The midfield is slow and uninventive while Mata and Sturridge drift inside on many occasions leaving Chelsea with no width.

However, forgetting the ‘bad moment’ as AVB’s predecessor would say, objectively, this season is one of transition under  a manager who has yet to adapt his style of play on a team who are largely based on a team that José Mourinho had. Many fans would say that there is no point in persisting on a manager for the sake of it, Chelsea aren’t even in the top four and are playing woefully of late. This is all true, but AVB needs to be given time, he needs to adapt his squad and the culture of sacking managers at a whim needs to stop. Hopefully, sense will prevail and AVB will stay to at least have an attempt to complete this project, otherwise, what was the point in bringing in a manger for the long term when all we think about is the very short term?

Posted by Chelsea fan Kieran Makwana 

Follow Kieran on Twitter @BigMak92