Frustrated Frank Lampard seeks a cutting edge from Chelsea after slow start

Blues boss wants team to be more clinical during periods when they dominate play
Action Images via Reuters/John Sibley
James Olley19 August 2019

Frank Lampard should be encouraged by Chelsea’s ongoing ability to produce spells of dominance but his team cannot wait too much longer to start capitalising on them.

Leicester ended this entertaining contest the better side by some distance with James Maddison guilty of missing the best in a series of second-half chances that could have wrecked Lampard’s homecoming completely.

Instead, it provided an accurate snapshot of where Chelsea are right now: united in purpose with an icon at the helm, capable of excellence but profligate in attack and defensively vulnerable.

These are, of course, formative days in Lampard’s reign and the opening 45 minutes as arguably the best Chelsea have put together since he took charge. But bereft of Eden Hazard’s talent for conjuring match-defining moments from meandering performances, the Blues need more than ever to be clinical during the periods in matches when they exert the greater influence.

They failed to do so at Manchester United and were only intermittently successful against Liverpool in Istanbul.

In Pictures | Chelsea vs Leicester | 18/08/2019

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Although fatigue from their Uefa Super Cup exertions was a factor – one exacerbated by Lampard making just one change to his starting line-up, reintroducing Mason Mount – Leicester were allowed to find a way back into a game that would have long been lost had Chelsea translated their early superiority to the scoreline.

Mount epitomised the early endeavour. Lampard wants his team to press high up the pitch as part of a front-foot style that denies opponents the chance to settle. Seven minutes into his first Premier League appearance at the Bridge, Mount robbed Wilfred Ndidi as he dawdled in possession, then steadied himself before firing low past Kasper Schmeichel.

Pedro had already fired into the side-netting before Mount and Christain Pulisic forced Schmeichel into saves. Ndidi’s error came as Leicester collectively sought to draw breath, attempting to play out from the back to get a foothold in the game.

Mount then headed a good opportunity straight at Schmeichel before N’Golo Kante sidefooted wide from Olivier Giroud’s excellent flick.

Leicester survived until the interval and improved thereafter, equalising through Ndidi before pushing for a winner that never came.

Hazard’s departure was always going to heighten the burden on those attacking players left behind. Mount looks a candidate to add much-needed goals from midfield – Kante, Jorginho, Mateo Kovacic and Ross Barkley scored just nine times in the League between them last term – but it is a big ask for a 20-year-old in his first top-flight campaign to deliver consistently.

Willian showed the effects of missing much of pre-season in a late cameo but his comeback bolsters the attacking options available to Lampard with Callum Hudson-Odoi and Ruben Loftus-Cheek also still to return.

But for the time being it falls on Pedro, Pulisic or Giroud to fill the void on a regular basis. All three performed well against Liverpool but struggled to reproduce their best four days later versus Leicester. That inconsistency will irritate Lampard if it continues.

“If there were frustrations in the crowd, there were frustrations in the team and on the bench,” he said.

“We're working in one way here and we want to do well. We know that in the circumstances that there are some tough elements this year. We couldn't bring players in, I couldn't as a new manager bring any players to help push the way I'm thinking, we lost Eden and he was so pivotal to this club.

“I think everyone's understanding of that and we will be patient, but again I don't want to use that as a huge factor. We can do better than we did for 60 minutes and we will do for sure. We need to look at how we played in the first half hour and replicate that because that was all of the team really at it. We need to sustain that.”

It is paramount in that context that Chelsea are defensively resilient. Questions may be asked of the zonal marking implementation which allowed Ndidi to climb unchallenged in the penalty area to equalise but while Kepa Arrizabalaga was not at fault on that occasion, the goalkeeper was responsible for several needlessly edgy moments.

Such uncertainty can spread panic and the Spaniard may find himself on the end of a reminder to keep things simple and prioritise composure over cavalier in dealing with the ball at his feet.

This might feel like a small point in the bigger picture but Lampard’s debut season is likely to be defined by such marginal gains given the need to extract every ounce of effectiveness out of a squad only strengthened by internal promotion and bereft of its outstanding star.

Antonio Rudiger’s return will help at the back. There are players to return going forward, too, but a Hazard-less attack is yet to take definitive shape.

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