How Sean Dyche would get the best out of Chelsea’s £1bn misfits
What might Chelsea look like were Sean Dyche leading the Todd Boehly “project”? It’s a fair question after Everton added the world’s most expensively assembled team to their list of victims.
Boehly has just put his signature to the highest individual sporting contract for a player in the world, hiring pitcher/hitter Shohei Ohtani at his American baseball team the LA Dodgers.
The man he appointed as Chelsea coach, Mauricio Pochettino, is knocking on his door to add to the billion the club has already sploshed on new players since he acquired Chelsea.
Instead of going all Tinseltown on players and coaches, perhaps a more minimalist approach might be better, something akin to the work unfolding at Goodison Park, where Dyche was brought in as fireman to rescue Everton from the inferno of relegation and continues in that role following the club’s 10-point deduction for financial breaches.
Dyche, with his shaven-headed, straight-talking, machine-tool-fitter demeanour, is easy to dismiss as a crude Sam Allardyce clone, a knock-it-long, set-your-stall-out old schooler, the antithesis of the Mauricios, Peps, Robertos and Unais more readily in vogue. Yet what would Pochettino have given for the virtues Dyche has instilled at Everton. Erik ten Hag, too, for that matter at Manchester United.
Indeed, as well as asking for yet more additions, Pochettino demanded an attribute that comes as standard with Dyche’s teams. He wants his players to show the requisite fight. Not the indiscriminate, brainless, get-stuck-in kind of ancient English stereotype, more the smart variety born of discipline and organisation. Everton did to Chelsea what Bournemouth did to United, they outworked and outthought their opponent, harnessed as they were to a clear idea and a plan of execution.
For Dyche it is simple. “It’s about finding ways to win. We had to fight and work. That mixture is really important over a season, never more so than recently with the news and the points [deduction]. To find ways of winning against a top side is pleasing. And under all that is a firm mentality that is growing all the time.”
Dyche went through the outstanding individual displays from his centre-back pairing of James Tarkowski and 21-year-old Jarrad Branthwaite, James Garner in midfield. He went on. He also applauded his staff for delivering the consistency of message. “Wins, losses, 10-point deductions, all of that. No. This is our focus. This is our responsibility. This is what we are doing. To get the players to take that on clear-mindedly is very pleasing.
“Management is a funny industry. You have to align everyone. That’s not an easy thing. When I finished as a player my first goal was to think what can I give them that is better than what I had? You have to win, all of that, but I have never lost sight of that. Can we rub off on the players and improve them? There are clear signs of that here.
“In the youth team, players are malleable. You can offer many things. As they get older it is more tactical nuance, maybe diet, mentality. You can offer another person a chance to improve. But you can only guide them. You can only offer and try to develop. Sounds easy but it’s not.”
You hear Pochettino and Ten Hag saying the same things but their teams do not deliver like Dyche’s Everton. Before he lands on a shape or style, Pochettino is seeking to identify leaders and build confidence in what is a callow, disparate group hastily pulled together.
Pochettino (left) is struggling to get a tune out of Chelsea (Photo: AP)
His trust in Mykhailo Mudryk is a case in point. Mudryk has qualities but not yet the trust of his team-mates. Pochettino believes time will cure this, but that is a commodity he does not have. Mudryk tries too hard and is thus counter-productive.
In midfield Conor Gallagher is Pochettino’s most dynamic player but not his best. He is still learning about balance, trying to blend expensive recruits Moises Caicedo and Enzo Fernandez. The problem is Fernandez and Gallagher are essentially the same player, or at least equipped to play centrally but neither is a No 10.
Dyche worked out that by jumping on Cole Palmer, Everton shut down Chelsea’s creative centre and made them easy to defend against. This why Pochettino wants to buy again. To get Chelsea up to speed by adding deeper experience in key positions.
There is a cult-like quality to Dyche, an energy that carries followers along with him. His problem has been the constraints with which he has always had to work. You wonder how expansive his teams might be had he the players at his disposal that are available to Chelsea.
Everton are designed to keep the opponent out and hit hard on the counter. The likes of Garner, Abdoulaye Doucoure and Dwight McNeil are critical to that template. It’s not pretty since it largely takes playing through the middle out of the equation, asking them to chase second balls in the opponent’s third. Yet when the gaps open as they did in the second half, Everton can be quick in transition, breaking through the open spaces in support of Dominic Calvert-Lewin.
Were Dyche able to add Alexis Mac Allister, Dominik Szoboszlai and Ryan Gravenberch as his neighbour Jurgen Klopp did at Liverpool in the summer, the composition and aesthetics of the Everton team might be different. He does not allow himself the luxury of dreaming. His art is in making best use of the resource he has. Nevertheless, three victories on the spin including the subjugation of Chelsea and Newcastle beg the question what a Dyche-powered Chelsea might shape up?
My Chelsea-Everton combined XI
*based on Sunday’s starting XIs
i put the question to Dyche in general terms, what would any Dyche team look like had he money to burn. He shook his head. “I don’t know. One that wins? That has always be my obsession. There has been some noise about the way I do things, you might have heard it. I hardly ever respond to that. I have not lost sight of what the game is about. It starts with a winning mentality. I would hope people look at my teams and say they will give their lot for the team. It might be old fashioned but it’s a powerful thing.
“Its always helpful if you have money. But it’s a constant work in progress. If things don’t go well for them games [three wins] the novelty wears off very quickly. People will say we have got to make changes. That’s the reality. They are the laws of the jungle as a football manager. I have been doing this a long time. There is still half a season’s work in front of us. The most important thing is next week.”
Chelsea close out the year with league fixtures against Sheffield United, Wolves, Crystal Palace and Luton, games that appear favourable but can quickly become pressure points should Chelsea fail to find rhythm and balance. Much rests on the availability of striker Christopher Nkunku and midfielder Romeo Lavia, neither of whom have played since their arrivals in the summer window.
Nkunku would provide a reliable and quick focal point in attack and Lavia might just be the creative midfielder to bind the whole. Getting both on the pitch would avert the need to buy again. The good news is they are training. The next two weeks might start to feel a lot like Christmas should Pochettino be in a position to select them.
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