Big Phil is out

The latest from Stamford Bridge is that after barely half a season Big Phil has been sacked. Not entirely surprising since Chelsea has slipped to 4th in the Premiership, lost its unbeaten streak at Stamford Bridge, and have only secured 1 point in 5 meetings against the other "big four." Not exactly a record that was world beating. The question becomes did the Brazilian deserve this fate? I mean Avram Grant had Chelsea in a better position this time last year...ouch. The following article captures much of what went wrong -

http://www.inthenews.co.uk/sports/football/sport/football-clubs/chelsea/what-went-wrong-scolari--$1267791.htm

For me there are a few reasons for the failure -

• First the ground work for failure go back a few seasons. When the Siberian billionaire, Abramovich started butting heads with the special one over players, it laid the ground work for team of superstars but a team without a soul. A few summers ago, Abramovich brought in the likes of Sheva and Ballack, but no one was convinced that Mourinho wanted either continental star - where would the aging Shevchenko play? And did he have the style of game to play in England? How about the German captain? Wasn't he redundant with Lampard? The special one had his hands full and it was clear that all was not well at Stamford bridge, coming off back to back premier titles the blues found themselves chasing Manchester United and never really demonstrating the clinical form they had the prior seasons. It was at the this point that the machine started to break down. Abramovich became too meddling, forcing Mourinho out, putting in a figure head in, in the form of Grant. Grant almost made his role permanent when he allowed Chelsea to make a run at a Champions League title as well as a Prem title. However, having failed at both, Abramovich had the perfect excuse to sack his manager and seek, what appeared to be, the most prestigious name out there - Scolari. However the damage had been done, Abramovich seemed to believe he could pick the players based on name and reputation alone, not on if they fit the system or specific need.
  

• The second issue was too many players for the same role. Big Phil was hamstrung with a team that was poorly put together, aging, and without any apparent youth. While it still contained bags of talent and veteran leadership, there was not enough diversity. There were many players that filled the same roles - Lampard and Ballack being the best examples. Then Deco was added (that was a Scolari move) adding another aging middle of the park playmaker to go along with Lamps and Ballack. And what about Joe Cole? Was he a winger, striker or attacking midfielder, again redundant with the above. Anelka was added in the mid season transfer window to cover for Drobga, but what happened when both were healthy? It was clear their games were not good matches and they have both suffered because of it, again too much overlap. Now some of this Scolari could have remedied during the summer transfer window - jettisoned Ballack, moved Drogba - but these were huge names with huge fees associated with them and there are few teams out there that would have taken them on, so by default Scolari had to hold on to them.
  

• The final issue, which I think is what truly hurt Chelsea this season was the loss of Essien and in some part at the transfer of Makelele to PSG. In these two players, Chelsea lost their engine. Of course I am not naive enough to believe that Makelele would have given Chelsea the silverware this season, but the double loss is what truly impacted the Blues for the worse. Last season was perfect, Essien did the bulk of the playing as the holding midfielder, while the older Makelele was used for the "big games" and rested for the less significant fixtures. Mikel was also thrown into the mix and Chelsea had themselves a nice rotation of players for the holding midfield role. This allowed the offensive minded midfielders to roam freely as well as alleviated pressure on the back four. Scolari walked into Stamford Bridge down one of those players - Makelele to PSG - and soon down 2 players once Essien went down for the bulk of the season. Without a realiable engine, Scolari started the campaign severly hamstrung. It has shown recently when Chelsea have not had the midfield presence that Makelele and Essien so aptly brought the side the past few seasons. Mikel, alone, was not able or willing to shoulder the burden, or maybe did not have the talent...

So Big Phil is gone and now Stamford Bridge is clamoring for the former star Zola to return to manage the side. Or maybe another name will emerge, but in the mean time it appears that one more contender has truly slipped into the list of pretenders and unless the Red Devils make a tremendous gaff the title will be theirs once again. By no means was this only Scolari's fault, he deserves some of the blame, but unfortunately he was dealt a not so good hand which he did not improve upon. Such is life managing professional sports.

Chelsea may be facing difficult times ahead. There are rumors Abramovich wants to sell the team. The team is getting older without any real youth stepping up (maybe Chelsea and Arsenal should merge, combining the veterans from Chelsea and the youth from Arsenal!). And there remains some difficult personnel questions - Drogba and Anelka, Ballack, Malouda, Alex, who will manage to name a few. Next season will be a telling time for Chelsea, either they will be an example of why a club cannot find long term success from a quick cash infusion or they will continue to build on what Abramovich gave them in terms of funding and Mourinho gave them in terms of management.

My guess it will be closer to the former.