Liam Rosenior’s limited attacking options led to defensive gamble | OneFootball

This is a syndicated version of this story, originally featured on the BBC Sport website.

Liam Rosenior’s substitutions in Saturday’s draw with Burnley have been questioned by some Chelsea fans.

The Blues started the game with two central defenders on the pitch, and ended the game with four, despite having lost one along the way to a red card.

You could argue that bringing on so many defensive players handed the initiative to Burnley. But there’s another angle to those decisions: there simply wasn’t a reliable attacking player on the bench for Rosenior to turn to.

Rosenior out of attacking options after red

Alejandro Garnacho in action against Hull. (Photo by George Wood/Getty Images)

His bench had a grand total of three league goals between them this season.

Estevao is a teenager, and missed the game with an injury. Jamie Gittens is also injured – and hasn’t done much to show he deserves to be relied upon in any case. Alejandro Garnacho is fit, but clearly not in form or favour.

When you add them to the discarded pile of Noni Madueke, Jadon Sancho and Joao Felix from last summer, it’s not a pretty picture. Pedro Neto has been the biggest success of all the wingers these sporting directors have signed, and even he struggles to live up to a massive £52m transfer fee on a consistent basis.

Their record of buying in these positions has been as poor as their record of buying defenders. The fact they’ve been able to get good fees for selling some of them shouldn’t disguise their repeated failure to upgrade the options available to their coaches, despite spending huge amounts.

Rosenior brought on those defenders to protect a one goal lead. If he had better attacking players at his disposal, that lead might have been two or three already. It’s a problem that needs to be sorted in the summer, but most fans have little faith at this point that the right moves will be made to do that.