Little better than ordinary on the ball the forward’s job was to throttle Chelsea attacks at sourceEarly on Sunday morning I was walking through my local park in south London, where around eight guys were playing football on the grass. At one stage, one of them ran clean through: round the keeper, goal at his mercy, only to roll the ball wide. “Daniel James!” he exclaimed to himself as he went to fetch it. “Daniel James,” he muttered again, shamefaced and still furious. And before long, all his mates were calling him “Daniel James” as well.About eight hours later, the real Daniel James was charging towards goal at Stamford Bridge in that rapid but largely innocuous style of his. Has...
Defensive set-up and an expectation that Carlos Vinícius could play the Harry Kane role saw an insipid display against ChelseaWith three minutes still to play at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium and the score 1-0 to Chelsea – as it had been for what felt like at least a fortnight – something odd happened to Carlos Vinícius. He had a chance to score a goal. Serge Aurier delivered a fine cross from the right. Vinícius leapt well, wrenched his neck and made contact.Spurs had woken up late in this game. Flustered, eyes still gummed shut, this drained and listing group of players had finally made it to the table. A point would have been a sensational return, even against a Chelsea...
Chelsea’s new coach is facing a hostile reception since, unlike Frank Lampard, he is not steeped in the club’s sense of identityIt’s never just a club. It’s never just about the players and whether they can put the ball in the net more times than their opponents. Your football club is always something else. Perhaps it’s a repository for nostalgic memories of childhood or home. Perhaps it’s a symbol of defiance against the establishment. Perhaps, particularly for top clubs who have the luxury of thinking about more than mere survival, it represents a way of playing.That’s why some Manchester United fans get so worked up when it’s suggested they are a club without a consistent playing philosophy, even when pointing...
During a slow-burn 0-0 draw with Wolves, Chelsea’s new manager was probably the single most animated presence inside Stamford BridgeWelcome, then, Thomas. At times such as these it is traditional to say something along the lines of: “If the manager wasn’t aware of the task facing him in the white heat of this, the English Premier League, then he will be now.” These are of course anything but ordinary times. But at the end of this enervating, slow-burn 0-0 draw with Wolves, during which Chelsea’s new appointment was probably the single most animated presence inside Stamford Bridge, it seemed unlikely Thomas Tuchel would find himself struggling with the fabled “intensity” of English football.Instead a debut Tuchel selection reconfigured into an...
It’s easy to make the case he has been overpromoted at Chelsea – but a more interesting question is whether he has failedWhy do people want Frank Lampard to fail so much? This seems like a reasonable question at the end of a week tickled and teased by rumours that Lampard is about to be sacked at Chelsea, that “elements” within the dressing room are already jimmying away at his fixings – all wrapped up in a gleeful surge of postmortems, pile-ons, and a tangible hunger for the great Roman to whirl his terrible scythe.And yet he still stands! No doubt to the anguish of many watching from the sidelines. Because people really do want Lampard to fall short, and...