Chelsea went through a difficult first half at the Molineux, going into the break at 2-2.
It only took 3 minutes for Chelsea to retake the lead in the second half, with Noni Madueke netting his first of three goals.
Despite all the focus being on Maresca’s tactics there was not a mega change from the first half compared to the second half.
Throughout the game, we saw us set up in his 3-2-5 on the ball and we saw a very aggressive rest defence but also the same persistent out-of-possession (OOP) structural issues.
The OOP issues aren’t entirely structural. They just rely on our ability to win duels and be in the right places at all times to effectively win the ball back and prevent attacks being launched against us.
The first half – a tragic showing of duels
If we don’t win said duels or aren’t positioned well, we are very susceptible to conceding reasonable chances against us.
This is what unfortunately we witnessed a lot in the first half, especially with Caicedo.
The first half – a tragic showing of duels. The players on the pitch won 33% of duels in the first half, Yes, 33%.
We often found ourselves very vulnerable during transition and conceded a lot of chances, 4 big chances and 1.75xG to be precise.
This was mainly down to being really poor in the duel and our press not being strong enough.
Moises Caicedo, as said above already, really struggled in the first half and was mainly at fault in the first goal by giving the ball away and then being far too weak allowing Ait Nouri to dribble past him and get an assist.
Another recurring problem, even last season at times, was the lack of press when employing a midblock.
The idea of a midblock is to force a team out wide and prevent a team from playing through you.
This can only be achieved if you reduce the time on the ball that opposition players have and if you are compact enough in your shape to reduce space for opposition players to receive passes.
Obviously, the latter is almost impossible to sustain throughout an entire game of football and you can not follow every run or drop to stop a player from receiving the ball.
Therefore, you must also press within the block and outside of the block to prevent the opposition picking out offensive players within the block.
At times, we allowed Wolves players to simply carry the ball well into our half with little to no pressure and everyone backing off.
This isn’t an example of us backing off in a midblock, but prior to this image we had lost 2/3 duels already and somehow still allowed Ait-Nouri to make the pass to Cunha which led to the goal, despite having two men around him.
It’s too weak and simply not good enough for the Premier League – you get punished.
The second half – a Masterclass in intensity
The second half saw Chelsea go into a 5-2 lead by the 63rd minute with Noni Madueke scoring all three goals.
We won the second half 4-0 whilst creating 3 big chances and 0.89xG and limiting them to just 0.21xG and 1 big chance.
So, what changed? Well, Duels.
We went on to win 57% of our duels in the second half, 24% more than the first half.
We were better placed and faster to win back the ball and we did it way more efficiently.
Our rest defence was also higher and more aggressive allowing them to actually win those duels more effectively and frequently.
This is what allowed us better control of the game, as is visible in the Match Momentum chart below provided by SofaScore.
Below is an image from the first half, showing how exposed we were after a turnover due to a mistake.
We can see five Wolves players running at our back three, all of which are retreating and no one placing pressure on the ball.
This is what resulted in Wolves getting so many chances.
Now, above, is the second half. Caicedo close by, Gusto about to engage and Cucurella also relatively nearby to get involved too.
If you go and find this clip, the ball goes out wide to Sarabia and Cucurella is there to engage.
Eventually Wolves do get the ball into our box but by then we have got 9 men back to defend, leading to us successfully preventing a chance.
This is just a small example of something that was very evident throughout the second half – better placement of player which, in turn, led to us winning more duels and halting Wolves on the transition.
Overall thoughts: A similar tale
So overall we seem to land on a very similar conclusion we landed on throughout pre-season and why we weren’t great at points against Servette.
In order for this system to flourish we need to be strong in the duel and play with intensity, aggression and ultimately work hard.
We lazed around in pre-season and against Servette in the UECL midweek and we all saw the issues.
It is up to Maresca to motivate these players and get them used to such an aggressive system and it is only then will we reap the rewards.
