Premier League 2018/19: Chelsea’s midfield vs Manchester United

This analysis of Chelseas midfield performance against Manchester United was first featured on our networks Chelsea site feelchelsea.com.

Another weekend and thus another decent display by Sarris men at the Bridge. The late equaliser reflects the resilience of the Blues which was missing among them a season before. Thanks to the Englishman, Ross Barkley. The midfielder is considered a strong attacking threat by the opponents whenever he teams up with Jorginho and Kante. However, with him in the central midfield, the Blues are very likely to be exposed by the counterattacking opponents, as they were by Mourinhos men. This is naturally due to the advanced role of Alonso, as being explained below. This calls for the need of having a central midfielder with defensive orientation adjacent to Alonso  like Kovacic  against the counterattacking opponents.

Alonso as an advanced left back

Chelsea play high more frequently or, say, quickly at the left vertical half of the pitch than it does at the right, and thats due to the quicker penetration of Alonso to join up the offensive patterns in the final third of the pitch than of his counterpart, Azpilicueta. Even though??Sarri makes his both fullbacks to join the attack only after their teammates would get the play up to the offensive half in possession, Alonso is still assigned the more advanced role than Azpilicueta. The heat map below shows Alonsos strong presence in the offensive half in the recent home fixture against again Manchester United.

Being part of Chelseas attacking circle once his team gets into the final third, Alonso also tends to step in thus either joining the deep offensive patterns with the other advanced teammates or preparing himself to conclude the attacks from the deeper regions.

This attacking orientation of the Spaniard in Sarriball set up left Chelsea vulnerable to counterattacks by the opponents in the second half when Joses men were all intended to shift to an aggressive attacking style from the first halfs low-block defensive approach. It can be seen in the following match-shots that Alonsos defensive position is not so strong and definitely needs someone from the central midfield to step out and provide the needed cover behind him. The absence of such cover would force Luiz to step out, which would create an even bigger danger for the Blues.