Why Enzo Maresca regrets not trusting young Chelsea defender in Leeds defeat | OneFootball

Enzo Maresca admitted that he regretted not playing young defender Josh Acheampong in Chelsea's 3-1 Premier League defeat to Leeds United on Wednesday.

Maresca's decision to deploy Trevoh Chalobah at right back, while using Tosin Adarabioyo and Benoit Badiashile as the centre-back pair at Elland Road, understandably raised some eyebrows.

Chalobah is versatile enough to play multiple positions, yes, but he has arguably been Chelsea's best-performing centre-back this season, so moving him out of the central area seemed risky.

In addition to that, Adarabioyo and Badiashile had only played together once this season, against Burnley, before the Leeds game.

Interestingly, Maresca admitted that he might have got his centre-back pairing wrong in the defeat.

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"One of the regrets I have after the (Leeds) game is that I didn't play with Josh," the Italian said in Friday's press conference.

"The reason why we played with Trevoh, Benoit, and Tosin was because we saw long balls to their strikers, but even that, we lost most of them.”

Adarabioyo have won the most aerial duels per game (3.4) at Chelsea in the Premier League this season, followed by Wesley Fofana (3.3), and Chalobah (2.3).

So it made sense that Maresca opted to start with Adarabioyo if he was hoping to cope with Leeds' aerial threats.

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Badiashile's numbers are surprisingly low in this area, winning only 0.3 aerial duels per game, but he is still the second-tallest outfielder on the team (1.94m) after Adarabioyo (1.96m).

Acheampong, on the other hand, is on the shorter side among Chelsea centre-back options, albeit only slightly, at 1.9m.

That said, he is arguably one of Chelsea's best ball-playing centre-backs alongside Levi Colwill, so his presence would have helped them absorb Leeds' pressing better when building from the back.

The 19-year-old last started for Chelsea in their 4-3 win over Wolves in the Carabao Cup in late October. He also made a brief cameo in Chelsea's 3-0 Champions League win over Barcelona last week.