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Chelsea will enter the land of giants on Sunday when they visit Goodison Park to face Everton and Mauricio Pochettino has admitted that in the Premier League length does matter.
Everton’s team is, on average, the tallest in the league and will likely feature at least five outfield players who are 6 feet tall or taller, while Chelsea’s are among the smallest and have conceded headed goals in their last 4 games.
It is surprising that while Everton have not conceded a single headed goal this season, six of the league goals Chelsea have scored have been headers; the last of which came from Manchester United midfielder Scott McTominay in their win over London. Trafford on Wednesday night.
McTominay would have scored twice with his head had it not been for a good save from goalkeeper Robert Sanchez and it is not hard to identify where Everton manager Sean Dyche, who was a spectator at Old Trafford, will try to gain an advantage at the weekend.
Before McTominay, Brighton’s Joao Pedro, Newcastle United defender Jamaal Lascelles, Manchester City’s Manuel Akanji, Brentford’s Ethan Pinnock and West Ham United’s Nayef Aguerd had all headed home against Chelsea this season. Everton’s 6-foot-2 striker Dominic Calvert-Lewin will be licking his lips.
Asked on Sunday if the difference in length between the two groups is a challenge for Chelsea, Pochettino replied: “It can be a challenge, yes. We want to be more competitive and try to avoid conceding opportunities such as corners or deflected free kicks. “We have to be prudent in the way we act and try to prevent them.
“In football, the important thing is the way you play the game, the attitude and then being smart, looking to give the warring sides the opportunity to play to their strengths. “
Chelsea opted to check out and sign 6ft-1in Declan Rice, who proved effective in both spaces with his header, in favour of paying £115m for Moises Caicedo to marry Enzo Fernandez in midfield.
Caicedo and Fernandez are indexed on Chelsea’s official online page as 5ft 10 inches tall, while Conor Gallagher is just an inch taller, meaning Pochettino’s side give up an aerial merit in midfield.
Arsenal’s signing of Rice is part of a conscious effort through head coach Mikel Arteta to develop his team’s height and a tall, resilient spine is a hallmark of the Gunners, Manchester City and Liverpool teams.
Pochettino acknowledged that length is vital when signing players, saying: “Yes, of course, when you build a team and build a team, yes, in the Premier League you have to pay attention to that [the length of the players]. It’s not that we’re going to protect more if we have bigger players, but I think balance is vital.
Only Sheffield United, Brentford and Luton Town have conceded more headed goals than Chelsea this season and all of the four goals Pochettino’s side have conceded from set-pieces have been headers.
Identifying the challenge is the simplest part, but solving it isn’t that simple. Levi Colwill has won the most aerial duels for Chelsea this season, but it was the England defender who got the ball over through McTominay at Old Trafford.
Colwill’s ability in the air and the vertically challenged nature of the Chelsea squad would possibly explain why he was used at left-back by Pochettino, who started with four centre-backs in his defence against Brighton.
When Pedro scored with a header in injury time, Chelsea had Colwill, Axel Disasi, Benoit Badiashile and Thiago Silva on the field, which would have been a frustration for Pochettino, angered by the nature of McTominay’s goal.
“We’ve got to get better,” he said Pochettino. Al admitting it this way, maybe I wouldn’t show too much emotion, but I’m upset. We have to work much, much better in those situations.
“It is both organisation and desire. For me, we need to stop the crosses. Because after if it is ‘Oh it’s not my problem because the opponent crossed’ then for the defensive line it is so difficult to defend these type of situations.”
Chelsea can’t rely on their defenders alone to control and prevent superior balls in their area. Caicedo and Fernandez were somewhere on the edge of the box when McTominay headed in his midweek goal.
Both of Chelsea’s £100million-plus midfielders have won more than half their aerial duels this season, but, combined, they have competed for nine fewer high balls than Rice has on his own. Where Rice puts his head where it hurts, the numbers would suggest that Caicedo and Fernandez prefer to duck out, along with many other members of Chelsea’s team.
Chelsea’s attacking trio of Raheem Sterling, Mykhailo Mudryk and Cole Palmer, despite being 6ft, 2in, have offered next to nothing in the air, competing for a combined 17 high balls, with striker Nicolas Jackson only managing a 38.2 per cent success rate from his 34 aerial duels.
Pochettino, unaware that Everton had yet to concede a headed goal in the league this season, said: “No, not yet?Hopefully we can [score with a header]. We’ll try.
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