Graham Potter sacked by Chelsea as board eyes Nagelsmann
Graham Potter has been relieved of his duties as Chelsea coach, a day after the club’s 2-0 defeat to Aston Villa at Stamford Bridge, and only almost seven months following his appointment.
The former Brighton and Hove Albion manager’s reign began with a nine-game unbeaten run, where Chelsea looked sharp and grinded results out despite a slew of injury setbacks.
Since then, Chelsea suffered 11 defeats in 22 matches, with a disconnected style of play and repeated changes to the line-up turning Potter’s place within the think tank more hostile as each match passed.
Failing to score in nine of the 22 matches he was in charge of Chelsea, intensified matters and laid further testament to the disjointed reading of the Englishman’s tactics by the players.
The defeat to Unai Emery’s spirited side meant Chelsea have now slipped to the bottom half of the table, and are staring down the barrel of their worst league finish since 1996.
Thanking Potter for his brief contributions in the Champions League, the club stated “Chelsea FC has announced that Graham Potter has departed the club. Graham has agreed to collaborate with the Club to facilitate a smooth transition. In his time with the club, Graham has taken us to the quarter final of the Champions League, where we will face Real Madrid. Chelsea would like to thank Graham for all his efforts and contribution and wish him well for the future.”
They also divulged that “Bruno Saltor will take charge of the team as Interim Head Coach.” Bruno played for Brighton and then took up coaching, eventually following Potter to Chelsea. He is set to take charge of the matters on the sidelines for Chelsea’s high-voltage encounter against Liverpool on Tuesday, 4th of April.
Unless, of course, the fast-paced Todd Boehly and co. find their next man.
Chelsea conduct talks with Julian Nagelsmann
As first called by transfer expert Fabrizio Romano, the Chelsea board have already approached recently-sacked Julian Nagelsmann to take up the head coach’s position. Nagelsmann was discussed by them in the wake of the club’s defeat to Villa, and at 35, is one of the most successful, tactically astute coaches available.
Also read: Is Nagelsmann Next In Line For Tottenham?
Nagelsmann steered Hoffenheim to the top tier of Europe not long after they were touted to be relegated, and followed that fearless, high-octane footballing philosophy to RB Leipzig, before lifting the Bundesliga title with Bayern Munich.
He’s already been replaced by former Chelsea manager and fan favorite Thomas Tuchel, and while there were suggestions of him taking a breather from management until the summer, things are moving quickly. They usually do when Boehly and Behdad Eghbali are involved.
A key aspect of note is Nagelsmann’s overall relationship with Chelsea’s representatives. He was involved when the West Londoners snapped up Timo Werner from RB Leipzig, as the pair have the same representatives.
Further, his like-minded footballing ideology matches that of Christopher Vivell, who worked with Nagelsmann at RB Leipzig and played a huge role in building the team’s structure.
Laurence Stewart, Vivell’s fellow club director, as well as Paul Winstanley (Director of Global Talent and Transfers) in fact, were chief decision takers behind Potter’s dismissal.
What Nagelsmann offers before anything else is an aura one would appropriately associate with Chelsea coaches, from the Ancelotti’s to the Mourinho’s. An attack-minded, relentless, and detail-obsessed tactician, Nagelsmann usually managed to get his teams to fire on all cylinders.
Whether he takes up the role immediately or decides against it remains unknown. But there’s plenty of procedure to be followed from Chelsea’s perspective, including getting in contact with Bayern Munich for compensation-related talks.
Potter’s sacking reflects on the cascade of board-related failures
Graham Potter lasted shorter than many of Chelsea’s previous coaches, a few of them who were in charge on interim basis.
He starred as a mastermind who came across building lesser valuable teams to become experts in possession and play expansive football capable of hurting the opposition in numerous ways.
Potter did it at Sweden with Ostersund and in England for Swansea as well as Brighton. When he made the big call to move to Chelsea, his Seagulls were in fourth place. And yet, he would go down as one of, if not the most, ineffectual managerial signings by the club.
Boehly and Eghbali, who share a long-term vision for the club, are more responsible for the season panning out the way it has than Potter himself, if various parameters are taken into consideration.
The co-controlling owners wrote “On behalf of everyone at the club, we want to thank Graham sincerely for his contribution to Chelsea. We have the highest degree of respect for Graham as a coach and as a person. He has always conducted himself with professionalism and integrity and we are all disappointed in this outcome.”
And while they’ve taken a prompt decision to sack Potter, the long-term vision of Chelsea as a club, a football team or a sporting organization has taken another hit.
Many have cited the lack of progress on the field as the overriding reason for the call. In all fairness, Potter has always required and thrived whenever given a pre-season with his group of players and coaching staff.
Not only did he inherit an unsettled squad with shocked players whose mentality has been questioned by many of his predecessors, but was dumped with more than half-a-dozen more by February as the club shelled out £288 million on January transfers.
The squad’s volume was elephant-sized as it is, and even bigger happens to be the size of egos inside the Chelsea dressing room. The owners have expressed their mentality, urgency and ambition towards Chelsea’s planning, but this decision contradicts the very notion of following a persistent approach towards building a squad.
Many would argue Potter never possessed the DNA needed to survive and excel in what is one of the most precarious jobs in club football. They could be right in months’ time, but we’ll never know because 11 months into their regime, the Chelsea owners are in search of the third manager.
On one hand they’ve identified Nagelsmann as the worthy replacement, while on the other, Luis Enrique and Ruben Amorim are on the Chelsea radar as well.
Chelsea have to tackle Liverpool and Wolves in the league before the headline fixture against Real Madrid. With 10 games to go, they’re just as close to fourth place as they are to the relegation zone.
-Akarshak Roy
Twitter: @RoyAkarshak
Photo: James Boyes. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license.