Chelsea’s
pre-season preparation continued to stutter along as they were beaten 1-0 by
Fiorentina on Wednesday. Adam Bate was at Stamford Bridge to see it and
wonders whether Jose Mourinho’s men might be set for a slower start to
2015/16…
"A very good training session." It was easy to lose count of the number of
times Jose Mourinho used the last two words of that sentence during his
post-match media duties following Fiorentina’s 1-0 win over his Chelsea team
at Stamford Bridge on Wednesday night. He simply couldn’t bring himself to
call it a match and, therefore, a defeat.
Despite the groans that greeted Cesc Fabregas’s misplaced pass as Chelsea
pressed for a stoppage-time equaliser against their Italian opponents,
there’s a sense that the home supporters – with last season’s title triumph
fresh in the mind – won’t have too much trouble putting this latest
pre-season outing into perspective.
Nevertheless, with players so fond of evoking the god of momentum when
pre-season goes their way, it follows that Chelsea are not necessarily
brimming with belief right now heading into Saturday’s Premier League opener
against Swansea. Gary Cahill admitted as much in his interview after the
game.
"Obviously you want to get the results during pre-season to give you the
confidence going into the season," the Chelsea defender told Sky Sports. As
it is, Mourinho’s men failed to win any of their four matches in the grandly
titled International Champions Cup in normal time and have also been beaten
by Arsenal in the Community Shield at Wembley.
The last two matches have failed to yield a single goal, with Cahill’s two
headers the only efforts on target against Fiorentina, and that puts the
ongoing absence of Diego Costa through injury into sharp focus on the eve of
the club beginning their title defence. But Mourinho was emphatic in his
support of new arrival Radamel Falcao on Wednesday.
"He is very good, he's very good for the situation," said Mourinho. "He
played at the [Copa America], then had his holidays, he has had one week of
training sessions, not the three weeks the others have had. I took him off
in his best moment when he was in his best moment in the game. I'm happy
with his evolution, very happy to be fair."
It’s true that Falcao looked busy and it was unfortunate for the Colombian
that much of his time on the pitch came in a first half playing alongside
his underwhelming compatriot Juan Cuadrado and a midfield pairing of John
Obi Mikel and Ruben Loftus-Cheek that was unable to provide the penetrative
passing to match their assured defensive work.
It was Loic Remy who had the benefit of playing for half an hour with
something approaching Chelsea’s first-choice midfield once Fabregas, Eden
Hazard, Willian and Nemanja Matic had been introduced from the bench.
However, the French forward squandered his one opening, cutting inside on
his stronger right foot only to skew his shot well wide.
For all Mourinho’s outward faith in his back-up options, this was another
reminder that Chelsea’s success last season was built on a core group of
players who were able to make it onto the field week in week out. In fact,
the champions suffered the fewest injuries and lost the least amount of time
to injuries of any Premier League team in 2014/15.
Hazard, John Terry and Branislav Ivanovic started all 38 games, while
Willian, Cahill and Matic featured in 36 of them with Fabregas involved 34
times. That’s seven outfield players missing only 10 games between them.
Could Chelsea’s squad men have stepped up if needed? Mourinho simply never
had to find out.
It seems likely that he’ll get his answers this season. But what was
striking after the Fiorentina game was how relaxed that the Chelsea boss
seemed to be with the situation. Instead he chose to emphasise that there is
a "long season" ahead. Even now, could he be mindful of his side’s sluggish
performance against Paris St Germain that saw them bow out of the Champions
League last March?
After all, having opening up with 10 wins and two draws from their first 12
games last season before grinding towards the finish line, perhaps Mourinho
is keen to time his team’s peak differently in 2015/16. We’ll soon find out.
"We have the real football on Saturday," he added. The question now is
whether or not we will be seeing the real Chelsea this weekend too.
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