There’s no doubt that Chelsea have taken significant steps forward this season under Enzo Maresca’s management, but there’s still a few areas they need to iron out.
During this November international break, Chelsea sit third in the Premier League table to represent a strong opening few months to the campaign.
Enzo Maresca has taken no time settling into his role as the Blues manager following his arrival in the summer. In fact, Jamie Carragher admits he was wrong about Maresca and Chelsea because he didn’t expect them to start the season so impressively.
One obvious area for improvement moving forward is definitely the defence. In 11 league games this season, they’ve only kept two clean sheets.
Rob Green has noticed Robert Sanchez makes Chelsea fans nervous
Rob Green, the former England and Chelsea goalkeeper, has delivered a pretty damning assessment of Robert Sanchez.
He thinks that the 26-year-old keeper makes the club’s supporters nervous whenever he’s on the ball, which is a lot because Maresca’s side likes to build out from the back.
When discussing Chelsea gloveman Sanchez, Green told The Athletic: “I have sensed there is a problem myself. I was at Chelsea v Brighton (when they won 4-2) and the tension in the crowd was palpable. There was an intake of breath from over 30,000 people whenever the ball was around him…
“I just think that, along with the passing, if you start looking for things to do, it then adds to the scrutiny, that the crowd are thinking: ‘What is he going to do now?’.
“For me, watching him play, you can tell he always has the belief that he can affect play, that he can come for the ball. He has a high starting position and will block off a lot of cutbacks but if you see his starting position for the Martinelli goal and draw a line, he should be in the middle of the goal, but his positioning is way off the near post, and Martinelli just hits it into the space.”
Chelsea goalkeeper Sanchez has an unwanted record, which is the most errors leading to goal in Europe’s top five leagues this season (three).
The Spanish shot-stopper regained his starting position at Stamford Bridge this season. However, Mark Schwarzer has urged Chelsea to replace Sanchez in their quest to start winning trophies again.
Robert Sanchez looks like a £25m goalkeeper
It cost Chelsea a £25m deal (BBC) to sign Sanchez from Brighton back in August 2023. So far, his valuation looks about spot on.
There’s times when the 6ft 6in keeper does impress in-between the sticks with the Blues, particularly with his giant frame and reflexes. Unfortunately, the goalkeeper is committing too many individual mistakes and costing his side frequently.
Here is a look at Sanchez’s individual statistics from the Premier League this season, where he’s played every single minute:
| Appearances | Clean sheets | Goals conceded | Save percentage | Pass accuracy | Acted as sweeper | Average rating |
| 11 | 2 | 13 | 76.4% | 73.9% | 17 | 7.01 |
Unless something drastically changes in Sanchez’s game, it’s hard to imagine him being the long-term starting goalkeeper.
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