Marc Cucurella’s gesture should already have a place in the Premier League’s season review. Hardly anyone has reacted to their own mistakes as confidently as Chelsea FC’s left-back. Although the Spaniard conceded two goals in the first eleven minutes of the game against Tottenham Hotspur on Sunday by slipping and losing the ball to his opponents, he complained in the direction of his coach Enzo Maresca. Cucurella, who became famous in this country for his handball in the European Championship quarter-finals against the DFB team, repeatedly shrugged his shoulders and spread his arms. In this way, he signaled that he did not place responsibility for the backlog on himself – but rather on the supervisors. From his point of view, they didn’t have the replacement shoes ready quickly enough. Sky expert Jamie Carragher criticized Cucurella’s reaction: “Absolute school stuff. Your fault, my son!”
After the material change, Cucurella, like the entire team, regained his stability. The Spurs, on the other hand, lost so much grip that it was as if they had put on Cucurella’s shoes. Chelsea beat Tottenham 4:3 (1:2) in an impressive comeback and is now suddenly in second place after four league wins in a row – four points behind league leaders Liverpool FC, whose game was canceled at short notice. Given their daring style of play, the Blues resemble a football boy band that had as much to talk about after the Tottenham match as teenagers did after their first night of partying: Cole Palmer’s penalty goals, Jadon Sancho’s form, Cucurella’s shoes – and their own ambitions.
Can the club intervene in the title race in this condition? Maresca quickly joked that rivals Liverpool, Arsenal and Manchester City “probably won’t slip up like Cucurella” this season. The coach said deeply that his team exceeded expectations, but was far away from the clubs mentioned. Matchwinner Palmer did not share his reticence. He stressed that after Arsenal and City’s draws they had to win – and that’s what they did. The young star had previously acted just as briskly on the pitch.
Cole Palmer has now converted 17 of 17 penalties
With his two penalty kicks in the 61st and 84th minute, Palmer duped Tottenham goalkeeper Fraser Forster: On the first penalty, the national player looked to the right and shot the ball to the left; then he looked to the left – and lofted the ball into the middle. Cool Palmer, as he is known on the island, has converted an incredible 17 out of 17 penalties in professional football. Not even England’s super shooter Harry Kane once came up with such a balance. Offensive colleague Jadon Sancho prepared both penalty scenes with wonderful passes.
On the last summer transfer day, Chelsea loaned Sancho from Manchester United for a year – including a commitment to buy for next season. Without any preparation with the new team, the winger initially needed a few weeks to build on his performances from the previous second half of the season at Borussia Dortmund. Sancho scored his second league goal in a row against Spurs, scoring the goal with a curling shot (17′). Enzo Fernández (73′) and Tottenham’s Heung-min Son scored in stoppage time.
The comeback in the London derby was a free team building measure for the squad that had been reassembled before the season. Chelsea’s fans exuberantly sang “It’s happening again” to their city neighbor: It’s happened again. The Blues also had a spectacular match at Tottenham in the previous season. The malice was probably understandable – because they themselves had to endure constant ridicule. Since the change of ownership in May 2022, the club under chairman Todd Boehly has signed 42 players for an outrageous amount of almost one and a half billion euros. Chelsea’s XXXL squad was said to be able to compete in every competition with its own team. That’s exactly what the Blues seem to be doing now.
The season so far shows that Maresca approaches games in the Premier League and Conference League with different teams. Most of the regular players in the domestic league did not appear once on the four international match days. Some of them haven’t even been registered for the Conference League yet. The reverse is sometimes the same: the professionals most frequently used in the European Cup hardly play a role in the league.
By splitting up the team, Chelsea is reducing the fundamentally high burden on its top players. So far they have been subjected to significantly less stress than those of their competitors, who are used almost continuously. This apparently gives the club a significant competitive advantage early in the season. The number of competitive games has continued to increase, the schedule is tight, but the Blues appear noticeably rested. They are also the youngest team in England and score by far the most goals. All of this suggests that Boehly & Co.’s daring calculation could pay off at some point – even if it will probably take years before the owners’ financial expenses are recouped.
An expression of the good mood at Chelsea FC was a post by Marc Cucurella after the game. He apologized to his colleagues for his mishap and published a photo showing his football boots in the trash.
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