Popular French journalist Julien Laurens is the latest to go in on Chelsea manager Liam Rosenior this week, after joining a long line of pundits, fans, and journalists wanting got go at the man.
I’ve felt a bit sorry for him, I can’t lie. My human side sees him as a good person, and I have empathy for him. I think he’s a nice guy. But as is often what happens in this life and this world, nice guys finish last.
The fact that pretty much the whole of the Chelsea fan base is now at the very least doubting him and asking major questions after just three months in charge, really does paint the picture here. Most Chelsea fans will always afford new managers plenty of time, but with Liam, that time seems to be up already with the majority. The manager merry-go-round is likely to continue, but this is far from all Liam Rosenior’s fault, and he is just another victim of the idiotic ‘project’ these owners have in place at my club.
Laurens said this week on RMC Sport:
“What Chelsea is offering is too poor, too mediocre. It feels like Rosenior isn’t up to the task. Chelsea gave him a six-and-a-half-year contract, and after just three months, we’re already asking questions.”
Then he added:
“The team looks lost at times defensively very fragile, no real structure in possession, and the heavy defeats – Everton, PSG especially – show that. You can’t hide behind ‘it’s early’ when you’ve conceded that many goals and the football is this uninspiring.”
He’s right. This is all correct. But some of it is also not on Liam. His tactics are too naïve and too open, for sure. But the owners and SDs knew him, they knew how he played. They knew he was coming in half way through a season and implementing new systems was always going to be a massive risk mid-season. They knew all that, but still went ahead and made those big and risky changes. They knew he is still a very inexperienced manager who would make many mistakes. That is all on them, not on Liam himself.
And yes, we are VERY defensively fragile. But that bit is entirely on the owners and those who make the decisions in recruitment. They are the ones that decided Robert Sanchez and Filip Jorgensen would be enough to compete at the very top. They were the ones who decided that despite two managers asking them for a new and better centre back that they would not sign one and just recall a raw 20-year-old from Strasbourg instead. They are the ones who then pumped out the PR saying that the options we have were more than good enough when clearly, they never were. That’s all on them.
But yes, Laurens is also right to questions Liam’s tactics, because they have also sucked. Oh dear, oh dear…
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