Chelsea is no stranger to rotating its squad.
The team’s victory in the Europa Conference League final in May was built on a starting lineup that was unrecognizable from the previous weekend’s Premier League fixture, with manager Enzo Maresca making wholesale changes from one game to another.
Things have not been quite so extreme en route to the Club World Cup final, today against Paris Saint-Germain, but Maresca has been resourceful in calling upon as many players as possible in the United States within an ever-growing squad.
Across the past four weeks, 27 Chelsea players have taken to the field, which is more than any other side competing in the tournament. Across its six games, Chelsea is averaging more than four changes to the starting lineup per game.
Chelsea has also played more games than many of its rivals, but its fellow semifinalists Fluminense (23 players), Real Madrid (22) and PSG (19) did not get near Maresca’s tally.
The number of players used stood at 36 for Chelsea’s Conference League exploits, also the highest among all teams in the competition.
Chelsea has an inflated squad to choose from, but Maresca has managed to rotate his lineup while still maintaining an element of consistency in the performances in getting to Sunday’s final at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey.
“When you play every three days in this competition, you need a big squad,” Maresca said after Chelsea’s semifinal victory over Fluminense. “But also they have to be ready, and they showed that. They are good players, but we can count on them with how professional they are, and this is something that we need for the future.”
Looking to the future is where things start to get a little muddy.
With an upcoming Champions League campaign on the horizon, Chelsea will need to register new players — including Liam Delap, João Pedro and Jamie Gittens — on top of its existing squad.
However, in line with UEFA’s squad registration rules, each team can register only up to 25 players on its “A list.” That means that Chelsea will either need to sell players this summer or accept that there will be some high-profile omissions from its European squad for the upcoming campaign with an already-stacked team.
But for this summer, it is not just Maresca’s flexibility in tweaking personnel but also the rotations of players’ roles that have been impressive. This was a theme of Chelsea last season, but to see it played out within such a condensed summer tournament has been notable.
Maresca has used this summer as an opportunity to shape-shift and experiment with new tactical ideas in a competitive environment before the new campaign — including a 4-2-2-2 shape against Flamengo.
“In the last two days, we tried something completely different,” Maresca said after Chelsea’s defeat to the Brazilian side. “We played in a different structure today to prepare for next season and have more options.”
While such tweaks are also designed to adapt to the qualities of the opponent, mapping Chelsea’s pass networks across each game underpins the differences in shape and personnel.
Marc Cucurella or Malo Gusto pushing high or tucking in? Pedro Neto starting on the left or right flank? Christopher Nkunku staying wide or helping to support Chelsea’s buildup (as he did against Fluminense)?
Some of the tweaks to personnel have been born out of necessity, through suspensions (Nicolas Jackson, Moisés Caicedo, Levi Colwill and Delap) or injuries (Romeo Lavia and Reece James).
In the case of James’ last-minute absence against Palmeiras after pulling up in the warmup, that made way for the 21-year-old Andrey Santos to make his first competitive start for Chelsea at the base of midfield, giving a good account of himself with neat and tidy passing and a few full-blooded challenges.
Similarly, Delap’s suspension gave Maresca the opportunity to thrust new signing João Pedro in from the start, with the Brazilian international repaying the faith emphatically by scoring a pair of stunning goals to send Chelsea through to the final.
However, plenty of other rotations have been more experimental from Chelsea’s coach. One notable tweak was Cole Palmer’s starting position on the left side of the attack in Chelsea’s victory over Benfica. Another was James’ inside role as a starting midfielder against Flamengo, which was notably less successful. Some tweaks have been a little more subtle, but there were plenty on the bingo card in Chelsea’s semifinal clash with Fluminense.
Neto started on the left flank but was able to play on the right side with just as much ease in the second half, as he has repeatedly shown across the season. Noni Madueke is adept at doing the same, arriving on the right wing (with Nkunku switching from right to left) before finishing the game on the left during his cameo.
The same was true of Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall in the closing minutes. Having come onto the field on the right wing, the 26-year-old started wide with Palmer inside, but by the end of the game, Dewsbury-Hall was playing inside as Palmer pushed into a wide area.
The sweltering conditions will have also been a key factor in Maresca’s decision-making during Chelsea’s time in the United States. He is often looking to the bench when possible to keep his side fresh until the final whistle.
“There is a different energy between Brazilian teams and European teams, it is because they had a one-month holiday six months ago. Our players last had a one-month holiday 12 to 13 months ago. It is a huge difference — so the weather conditions plus the difference of calendar make the levels in the team very close.”
In the next few months, that elephant in the room of exactly how Maresca will juggle — or, rather, register — each member of Chelsea’s squad for its next international games will linger.
Whatever happens today in Chelsea’s final against Paris Saint-Germain, Maresca will have learned a great deal about the flexibility of his squad during its summer in the United States.
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
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