Enzo Maresca questioned over squad management after 5 players push to leave | OneFootball

Chelsea finally got a win this week – against Southampton on Tuesday night – and now the briefings are out backing Enzo Maresca.

The Athletic’s long read about the recent slump is convinced that everyone is still behind the coach, who arrived from Leicester last summer with no top flight experience in any league:

“There are no indications that Maresca’s standing in the dressing room has been damaged by Chelsea’s bad run,” it reads.

“He is held in high regard by many players for the quality of his training sessions and his attention to tactical details. While the broad structure of his system has remained consistent this season, he has also garnered credit for his flexibility in making tweaks to individual player roles and positioning from game to game.”

We’ve already written about one of the negatives however – the idea that the players held a meeting to discuss their standards in training does not reflect well on the coach at all. He should be the one holding his squad to high standards, and not allowing the situation to spiral out of control to the point where the players are the ones unhappy.

Maresca squad management under the microscope

Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall in conversation with Enzo Maresca. (Photo by Mike Hewitt/Getty Images)

There’s also a mention in the piece of sources “questioning whether Maresca might have managed certain situations better” when it came to his big squad. It was certainly notable that first team players Joao Felix, Axel Disasi and Renato Veiga all appeared to push to leave in January, as did Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall and Christopher Nkunku, who ended up staying.

But that looks a harsh criticism to us – it’s Maresca’s job to pick the strongest team every week. If he has unhappy players who aren’t playing enough, that’s really on the people who put the squad together.