3 Changes Sarri needs to make to turn Chelsea into title contenders

Maurizio Sarri's honeymoon at Chelsea came to an abrupt end in London last weekend when Chelsea received a drubbing at the hands of city rivals Tottenham Hotspur. Goals by Dele Alli, Harry Kane and Heung Min Son gave Tottenham a comfortable 3-1 win.

More than the scoreline it was the manner of the defeat that raised eyebrows as Chelsea were by far second best in what was a thrilling display by Tottenham. At no point in the game did Chelsea look in control of the situation.

While this was Sarri's first loss as Chelsea manager, he admitted that the performance was 'a disaster' - a word he used thrice during his post-match press conference.

Here, we take a look five changes Sarri must make to turn Chelsea into a title contender.

#1 - Make Kante Great Again!

Italian midfielder, Jorginho has been key to Sarri's system since his days at Napoli - and with good reason. The Brazillian born midfielder has in the past revealed that he considers Xavi and Pirlo as his role models.

In Sarri's system, it would not be unfair to say everything goes through the 26-year old midfielder who sits in the base of midfield controlling the tempo of the game. Belgian powerhouse Radja Nainggolan has called Jorginho as the toughest opponent he has ever faced because of how quickly the former 'distributes the ball while being practically stationary'.

However, Pochettino's targeted man-marking of Jorginho using multiple players to do so severely affected Chelsea's ball transition. Jorginho also struggled in the defensive aspect of the game, failing to close in on Harry Kane, giving the latter time and space to take a long distance shot that led to the second goal followed by his inability to deal with Heung Min Son for the third goal.

This is not to say that Sarri should radically change his system, one that has served him well in the past few years. Not every team in the League has midfielders and attackers of the quality required to replicate Pochettino's tactics successfully.

However, it would behove Sarri to consider playing N'golo Kante either as the holding midfielder or sitting deeper in a double pivot next to Jorginho in certain games of the season when facing tougher opponents - the upcoming game against Manchester City next month for example.

N'golo Kante is widely considered as the best Defensive Midfielder in the world

N'golo Kante who is widely considered one of the best defensive midfielders in the world recently signed a new 290,000 pounds-per-week contract with Chelsea making him the club's highest paid player.

This decision, however, has come at a cost as Kante's defensive contribution has fallen to 1.8 tackles per 90 minutes from 3.4 and 3.6 per 90 minutes in the last two years.

Playing the 27-year old Frenchman in a deeper role is a solution that Sarri must consider in certain games to avoid a repeat of what happened over the weekend.

#2 - Transfer Market pragmatism-

Maurizio Sarri, when asked recently whether he had requested signings in the January transfer window, denied the need to do so.

“I have to think I only have to help these players to improve. It is too easy to go into the market for every problem. I think we need to improve and we need to improve with these players because they can improve"

Sarri is the type of manager, who believes in improving his squad by 'coaching his players to be better' rather than dipping into the transfer market.

While this is an admirable and endearing quality Sarri needs to take a more pragmatic approach to football if he is going to win his first league title in his history as a manager.

Pep Guardiola, a similar manager stylistically and a football hipster favourite did not achieve the success he has had at Manchester City purely by coaching his players to become better.

Since Guardiola joined Manchester City, the club has invested a whopping 402.64 million pounds outspending Chelsea (151.42 million) by an almost 3:1 ratio. (This adding to the already massive 272.92 million pounds 'invested' under Pellegrini).

Note - this figure is after profits from sales of players are taken into account i.e net spend and not total expenses. Net spend unlike total expenditure reflects the amount invested by the club to improve the squad.

Guardiola did not waste his time trying to coach older players like Zabaleta, Yaya Toure, Kolarov, Navas and Sagna. Instead, he replaced them with expensive young players who could be given the final touches to their development.

While Sarri must work towards bringing the best out of young Chelsea players like Barkley and Ruben Loftus-Cheek - he must actively use the transfer market to replace players older than 30 like Willian, Pedro and others.

To beat a club like Manchester City which is outspending you massively as it is - relying mainly on 'coaching' alone is not an answer.

Roman Abramovic has never been an owner known for showing patience when it comes to managers if they don't deliver titles immediately.

Sarri must keep this in mind.

#3 - Remove Chelsea's dependence on Hazard

Chelsea depends on Eden Hazard much more than it should

One of the reasons why Manchester city was so dominant last year was because of the end product from midfield. While Aguero and Gabriel Jesus scored 30 and 17 goals respectively in all competitions last season, Manchester City's midfielders contributed a lot of goals from midfield.

Raheem Sterling - 23 goals

Leroy Sane -14 goals

David Silva - 10 goals

Kevin de Bruyne - 12 goals

Bernardo Silva - 9 goals.

Gundogan - 6 goals

Fernandinho - 5 goals

Total goals scored from midfield - 79

At Chelsea, the situation is quite different. Eden Hazard is the only player who can be expected to score more than 15 goals a season across all competitions.

Chelsea's Strikeforce has not really been delivering since the departure of Diego Costa. In addition to this is the reality that other midfielders at the club simply do not have the ability to reliably and consistently score enough goals from midfield to challenge for the title.

'The Pensioners' this season, have enjoyed possession of up to 80% in many games. However, this clear lack of end product from midfield and attack has meant that they are often unable to capitalise on it.

Sarri must bring in at least one wingers and a striker who can take some of the burdens Goalscoring off of Hazard.

Edited by Emeka Monyei