Liam Rosenior was dismissed yesterday (22) from Chelsea and I completely understand those who celebrate it, and I even agree. It’s a good decision, because, being direct, he doesn’t have the level for a club like this. But the problem is seeing a lot of people celebrating as if he were the main problem, and he isn’t.
Rosenior had good moments at Strasbourg, yes, but there was never really a solid foundation to believe he was ready to make this step. And at the same time, I also think he was completely thrown to the wolves. First, because of the absurd pressure that already exists just from being Chelsea. Second, because all of this starts before him.
The dismissal of Enzo Maresca made no sense at all. He was doing a job that was, at the very least, positive, getting almost the maximum out of a clearly unbalanced squad and even managing to achieve things like the World Cup. The same group that made that decision is the one that then hired Rosenior and now fires him to go and get someone else.
And here is the real problem. It’s not the manager. It’s the people in charge.
We’re talking about a group that has spent around 2 billion on young players, as if this were Football Manager. As if putting together young talent automatically created a competitive team. It doesn’t. This isn’t a game. It doesn’t work like that in real life.
And then people ask why Chelsea don’t evolve, why they don’t return to the top. How are they supposed to, if the people making decisions keep getting it wrong consistently?
I also don’t blame the players. We’re talking about millionaire contracts, about changing their lives and their families’ lives forever. Of course they’re going to accept. The same goes for Rosenior, I saw a lot of people saying he shouldn’t have accepted. That makes no sense. Who turns down an opportunity like this with millions involved? It’s easy to talk from the outside, but in reality no one does that.
The reality is simple: Chelsea are completely without direction. Managers can come and go, you can change the name on the bench as much as you want, it’s very unlikely to fix the structural problem.
As for Rosenior, I don’t know how he’s going to recover from the negative image that’s been left, because right now he’s almost being treated like a joke. But he’s young, he still has time and can absolutely rebuild his career in a more stable environment.
Conclusion
Rosenior’s departure is good news, yes, but Chelsea’s problem goes much deeper than that.
As long as the people making the decisions stay the same, they can change managers as many times as they want: the circus will keep being a circus.