Looking back to what happened last season, all of us surely agree what positions we need to upgrade. First, it’s our striking force. Second, it’s our defensive midfielder. For quite a long period we missed the presence of the real anchor Claude Makelele. Michael Essien has lost it and we’re afraid he’ll never make it anymore. As one of the better, John Obi Mikel provides us safety with his short simple passes in our own area but he’s fairly inconsistent last season. Oriol Romeu had injury season and his performance during Di Matteo spell was a bit off. That’s why we’re continually linked with some talented defensive midfielders recently, and the last names are the well-known Nemanja Matic and World Cup 2006 winner Daniele De Rossi.
First of all I would like to tell you that we’re talking on defensive midfielder: a midfielder who focuses on defensive duties such as marking, intercepeting the ball, and tackling the oppositions, covering the positions whenever full-backs, midfielders, and centre-backs as they’re going forward or caught out of positions, and then distributing the ball from high pressure from opponents to team-mates who have more space: whether it’s back passes, forward passes, to the flanks, or even to kick the ball away to supporters’ seat just to cancel opponent’s offense. But the main task is simply as its name: defensive. Not in that duty to deliver beautiful ball forward. That means, we’re not talking about beautiful-passer-bravado like Xabi Alonso or Andrea Pirlo. They’re midfielders who dictate the game from deep position. Or say, they’re deep-lying playmakers. Not defensive midfielders.
Let’s continue then. As I said defensive midfielder position must be upgraded, it’s not in my mind we have to deal with big money spending like we did in purchasing strikers. Not that I underrating defensive midfielder position, but simply because we’re only need one or two player as we don’t really use more than two defensive midfielders in our starting line up regularly. Just have a look at what formation we use in last two seasons: 4-2-3-1 which only needs two defensive midfielders at the most. Luckily, it wouldn’t happen as one of the two “pivot” would surely belong to box-to-box or attacking-minded midfielders like Ramires, Lampard, and the possibility of Oscar and De Bruyne to fill the spot.
Before we’re going to sign anyone for the spot, I advice you to get a quick look to what we already have in Stamford Bridge. Here goes the names:
Nathan Ake
“Actually I prefer to stay at Chelsea. This way I think you learn the most because you’re playing with such big players, if you’re playing. The other option is to go on loan but we have to see about that.”
Ake is naturally a centre back who can play as defensive midfielder as well. He also had a decent debut under Rafa Benitez despite hadn’t really exceptional. I’m not even thinking he could be a better defensive midfielder than Mikel but his versatility is a good option for Chelsea to not loan him out. Especially when he wants to stay like previous season, even as a backup.
Nathaniel Chalobah
“I just really have to prove myself as a player and do the best I can to try and get myself into the Chelsea team.”
Making 42 appearances and scoring 5 goals in total. Yes, Nathaniel Chalobah play as midfielder and defensive midfielder in his loan time at Watford. Helped by our lovely man Gianfranco Zola, he’s really improving to be one of the best players in Championships and pocketing England Men’s Youth Player of the Year award for 2012. I believe that he improves a lot so I think he should get promoted to play on higher level: Premier League. Loan him again to Premier League side is good option but at the age of 19, there’s no rush for Chelsea to do so. In fact, he could join first team as backup/rotation for Mikel, learn some from his seniors, and the most important is having a better understanding with his blue team.
Ruben Loftus-Cheek
“I was confident and you have to have that when you’re playing in the first team, especially against a good side like City with top players. I tried to be confident and play like I do with the reserves and youth team.”
Many of Chelsea fans probably saw him first time during Chelsea clash vs Manchester City at Yankee Stadium which ended with 5-3 scoreline. I can say that I’m not one of those many Chelsea fans as I already watched him in youth team quite a lot. It doesn’t surprise me that Barcelona looking to get his signature as he’s one of our brightest talent in Chelsea youth team. What surprised me was that he didn’t involved in our first team during injury-problem under Rafa last season. Still 17 at age, he could still spend his time on youth team and no rush for him to go on loan. Instead, I would like to see him spend more time with youth team for 2-3 seasons. Then go on loan when he really needs regular time to play at higher level.
Their chances, I have to say, is depend on who’s under Mourinho’s radar. If we’re looking to strengthen defensive midfielder position, I’d be happy if we’re going to buy the right one – world class level without really expensive price tag. But if we couldn’t purchase anyone, I don’t really mind as these youngsters would provide us better depth than last season. But if Mourinho and Emenalo decide that these kids need to go on loan, I’d be happy too. Here’s hoping these players will develop regardless where they would play next season.
Best teams in the world don’t really play with a defensive midfielder but a player who can spread the game from deep. I can’t see the point of having a strong defense plus one extra defender(defensive mid). Ballack last three games for Chelsea had to play in anchor position because of Mikels injury, we scored 17 goals and conceded none. If I am not wrong 8-0 to Villa 2-0 away in Liverpool and 7-0 to wigan.THAT WASN’T LUCK, IT WAS THE DIFFERENCE OF HAVING A PURE DEFENSIVE MID OR HAVING SOMEONE WHO HAS AN ATTACKING VISION PLAYING IN A DEEP ROLE WHO CAN SEE A QUICK PASS FORWARD FROM A DEFENSIVE SITUATION. THATS WHAT A BIG TEAM NEEDS AND NOT “5” DEFENDERS… I BELIEVE 🙂
you forgot naming Essien who was very good defensively at that time. He put himself in great position to break opposition’s attack, his physical attributes were also key to our marauding midfielders. Ballack was exceptional but it’s only Wigan and Villa. Imagine if we had to deal with Barcelona or Bayern…
I’d say don’t sign any defensive midfielder we have young lads who could do the job, and if theres a place in the team where we don’t have much presure for players to develope its the DMF position.
sell mikel !!!!
DMF next season :
de rossi/xabi,romeu and ake/loftuscheek
either of KDB or Oscar should be turned into a deep lying playmaker. the other one of the two sitting in front of the backline should be a workhorse. so imo this should be the pairing-
kdb/oscar- ginckel/ramires/ake.
@ Carlos How can u say all the best team in the world don’t v defensive midfield roles
Barcelona- Sergio Busquets
Real Madrid- Sami Khedira
Bayern- Javi Martinez
Juventus- Arturo Vidal
Manchester City- Yaya Toure
Manchester United- Carrick
U shd v said Chelsea is always trying to be too cautious n we prefer to v a pure DM dt passes sideways on instructions.
Pls watch Tahiti Vs Nigeria today. Be the Judge.
Mikel plays the deep lying playmaking for us.
But we undermine him @ Chelsea.
Which of the mentioned players never scored a goal for their clubs? you will have to ask mikel why he just sits back for chelsea and not for nigeria. David luiz plays for chelsea and he goes forward when possible scores goals even Jt runs forward, why not mikel? Is it because we undermine him at chelsea? I think mikel is a very gifted player but he makes chelsea a more defensive team. even busquets intercepts much forward, scored for exple in semi of CL (INSIDE THE BOX IN OPEN PLAY)Toure, Carrick khedira give much more to their team on the attacking play than Mikel you have to admit.
as I said, Mikel is solid defensive midfielder so his main task is defending. I don’t really care whether he or any defensive player scores or not as long as he’s doing great defensively. As much as a I dont care whether Torres defend or not as long as he scores. Why Mikel never scored for Chelsea? simple: our midfielders and defenders are love going forward. We’ve seen the best MIkel-Lampard combo or Mikel-Ramires in the pivot of 4-2-3-1 last 2 seasons. But when Lampard-Ramires played together, our midfield was crashed even to smaller teams because there’s so much space to exploit. With that in mind, who’s gonna stay behind especially when defenders like Luiz and Cole disappear from their post? Mikel.
Football is evolving as any other thing out there.
15 years ago,There was nothing like a winger who cuts inside very often to score goals.wingers who always cross balls are no more or extinct.
Deep lying playmakers(Regista) though different are better versions of Defensive midfielders(DM).They don’t usually have the strength and physical prescence as the DM’s..What they’ve got is the ability to read the game and make interceptions,Keep possesion and always make sure that every pass counts..Regitas can pass.Trust me I mean pass….accurate long,short,diagonal etc(Alonso,Pirlo,De Rossi,Scholes) they can also shoot from distance.
They are called Regista which I thnk means Director,or co ordinator of something in italian lang.
They dictate everything from deep..
U’ll either hav to mark them with u’r strikers which means u won’t score(Holiday for the defenders) OR mark them with your midfielders which also means Game over…Coz the Trequartistas(the advanced playmakers) will be free…
*SO that’s the thing….it’s extremely difficult or impossible to mark them.
Out of the youngsters you metioned,only Ruben Loftus-Cheek looks the part….
I watch the kid play and all I see is a young Michael Ballack…. I mean BARCA doesn’t chase a CHELSEA kid or Abramovich doesn’t offer a 17year old a contract worth £1.7million unless there’s something extra about him…
Thanks for such an informative post.
It is really great to go through such an insightful post.