Perhaps Chelsea and their head coach Enzo Maresca have to consider whether they need to tinker a little with all the tinkering.
It was after the 5-1 Champions League home win against Ajax in October that The Athletic explained why Maresca is regularly going to make multiple changes to his starting line-up, as well as lots of substitutions in the matches themselves. Regular readers cannot say they were not warned.
This is a club-wide strategy, not just something being done on a whim by Maresca, and the theory is sound. This is a season that could stretch to 67 matches (in the unlikely event they reach the finals of all three cup competitions domestically and in Europe) after a summer in which they were made to work very hard to win the Club World Cup in early July, capping a 64-game campaign, and before a portion of their squad head off with their national teams to the World Cup.
The thinking behind the plan is that rotation controls the load management of individual players and will help avoid injuries. Their methods have been rewarded with the sight of captain Reece James, who missed a lot of football with various issues over the course of three years (late 2021 to the same time in 2024) playing regularly over the past 12 months. Another part of the ploy is for the squad to be fresher for the run-in than those teams who pick the same players every week throughout the season.
Maresca has certainly delivered when it comes to rotating the squad. He has now made 119 changes to the starting XI in just 23 matches (all competitions) — that is an average of more than five (5.17) per game. That 119 figure is the most made by any Premier League manager or head coach.
As we saw in the 2-1 loss away to Atalanta on Tuesday, it is not just about what Maresca is doing between fixtures, it is the regular use of his bench during matches, too. Chelsea’s head coach took his number of substitutions this season past the hundred barrier (101) last night. That is an average of more than four per game (4.39). Is it any wonder that Chelsea have lacked consistency when they do not have a consistent team on the pitch for every fixture?
To be fair, nobody was complaining about this philosophy 10 days ago, when Chelsea followed up a 3-0 European win over Spanish champions Barcelona with a very creditable 1-1 draw against Premier League leaders Arsenal while playing with 10 men for nearly an hour due to Joao Pedro being sent off. They were also in good positions in the Premier League and Champions League tables.
But lost amid the deserved praise they received was that those two matches represented the fewest amount of changes Maresca had made between games in the campaign so far at just one (Joao Pedro for Alejandro Garnacho). Despite being a man down for so long versus Arsenal, it is also the least substitutes Chelsea’s head coach has made in a fixture at just two (Liam Delap and Garnacho on for Joao Pedro and Estevao respectively).
The fact Chelsea were able to produce two such high-calibre displays against top opposition with mostly the same players on the pitch must provide some kind of evidence that less can be more? Since then, Maresca has made 16 changes to the first XI plus 12 substitutions in just three fixtures. And the reward? Three disappointing results, let alone performances, of two defeats (to Leeds United and Atalanta) and a draw (against Bournemouth).
A month ago, former England striker turned pundit Wayne Rooney spoke out against Maresca’s/Chelsea’s methods following a disappointing 2-2 draw at Qarabag of Azerbaijan in the Champions League (seven changes to the starting line-up, then five substitutions).
Speaking on The Wayne Rooney Show on the BBC, he explained: “The players want to play, they want to build relationships. When you keep chopping and changing, then the players won’t be happy. That will come back to bite them. If they are getting results all the time, then you can’t question it, but if they’re not, there have to be questions asked.”
Rooney must surely still feel his comments were justified. Maintaining a high level of performance has been an issue for Chelsea from the beginning of the season, not just against Qarabag or over the past week. They have lost more than a quarter (six in 23) of their matches across all competitions and drawn another five. That gives them a win percentage of just over 50 per cent (52.17).
Maresca defended the strategy — he has the full backing of the club’s top brass to manage the squad in this way — following Rooney’s comments. The question over whether the methodology is a factor in Chelsea’s varying form was put to him again after this loss in northern Italy. He replied: “I think tonight, first XI, we had inside the pitch eight, nine players that they play against Tottenham, they play against Barcelona, they play against Wolves, Arsenal.
“So if you see the five changes that we did compared to Bournemouth, it’s different. The ones that play tonight are the ones that are playing almost all the games.”
Some changes are obviously enforced due to injury or suspension. Maresca is also concerned when a player, particularly a defensive one, is on a yellow card. His decision to replace Trevoh Chalobah with Wesley Fofana at half-time for that reason last night backfired, though. Fofana did not get up to the speed of the game as Atalanta equalised 10 minutes after the restart, with the centre-back losing track of striker Gianluca Scamacca. To make matters worse, the France international had to go off himself due to suffering a blow to his eye, and Tosin Adarabioyo entered the fray on 76 minutes.
Wesley Fofana endured an evening to forget in Italy (Alessandro Sabattini/Getty Images)
Fofana is not a bad player and is one of the individuals whose minutes have to be monitored because of his injury record. But most managers will resist the urge to alter their back four mid-match in particular, especially while boasting a 1-0 lead, as Chelsea did against the Serie A side.
Taking off a clearly tired Enzo Fernandez in the 67th minute was fair enough. But bringing on right-back Malo Gusto for him did seem odd, with James and Moises Caicedo already operating in midfield. Andrey Santos and Estevao were ignored, so that substitution left Chelsea with less creativity and threat on the pitch.
This is not to say Chelsea should abandon Plan A completely. With so much demand on elite footballers these days due to the intense schedule, you have to take steps to minimise the damage.
The point being raised here is whether it has to be so many changes, that often. At the moment, the results are not justifying the means enough to carry on regardless without giving it a second thought.