Enzo Maresca witnessed his Chelsea players return after the international break with a big win at home to Tottenham.
Chelsea secured a 1-0 victory over rivals Spurs on Thursday night to keep themselves firmly in the race for Champions League qualification. As a result, they sat in fourth position in the Premier League standings going into the weekend’s fixtures.
Enzo Maresca, the Blues manager, is desperately trying to bring Champions League football back to Stamford Bridge during his first season at the club.
| Matches | Wins | Draws | Losses |
| 44 | 26 | 7 | 11 |
Meanwhile, Spurs boss Ange Postecoglou is under immense pressure because his side are languishing in the bottom half of the Premier League with 34 points from 30 games. Incidentally, Postecoglou’s record against Chelsea is now four defeats from four meetings.
Jason Cundy noticed Enzo Maresca completely change his philosophy during latest Chelsea game
In Chelsea’s win over Spurs, they had to hold on to a one-goal lead for a tense 12 additional minutes, demonstrating some well-organised and resilient defensive work.
Jason Cundy has applauded Blues head coach Maresca, claiming that for “the first time” he made a big change in his tactics to help hold on for three points. This included using centre-half Tosin Adarabioyo as a substitute and switching from a back four to a back five.
Cundy said via talkSPORT: “He (Maresca) brought on Tosin and went to a back five. We basically said to Spurs you’re going to have the ball, we’re not going to give you space in behind, we’re not going to allow you counter.
“It’s the first time I’ve seen Maresca make a big, bold decision that’s saying I’m now going to change tactics the way I set up. I’ve got [Pedro] Neto down the middle, so I’ve still got that threat of the pace over the top. I thought we dealt with hit really well.
“Maresca showed a different way of managing this Chelsea team. We are guilty of times of being a bit naive in-game… Last night, I felt there was a bit of a maturity about Maresca and I was really pleased to see he’s gone I’m going to be stubborn, sit in, break us down if you can.”
Maresca’s style of play is centred around possession-based football, something which can sometimes frustrate the Chelsea supporters because he firmly sticks to it.
It was so refreshing to see the Blues mix it up with a low block to grind out the Spurs victory, though.
According to Blues central defender Levi Colwill, Chelsea’s players love life under Maresca because of his ideas and impact at the club.
Without a doubt, there are still some areas of the squad that need fixing and improving. But we felt it was a really positive step seeing Maresca’s in-game management come to the fore in midweek.
What Enzo Maresca said about tactical shift versus Tottenham
During his post-match interview after the Spurs win, Maresca did open up on his decision to shut up shop and implement a defensive structure in the closing stages.
The Italian head coach said via Chelsea’s official website: “Probably since day one we don’t work every day to win the game in the way that we played in the last 10 minutes, in terms of waiting for them and giving the ball to them. But if you want to become a team I think you need to also learn to play how we played in the last 10 minutes, to win a game in a dirty way.”
When Chelsea travel to Brentford on Sunday for their next league game, we’re sure there will be times when they need to defend well again.
Trevoh Chalobah and Levi Colwill, two products of the Chelsea academy, certainly looked good as a centre-back pairing at Spurs. We cerainly wouldn’t be breaking that combination up at Brentford.
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