Why Chelsea need to replace David Luiz before it ruins their season
Chelsea have suffered defeats of the nature of – 4-0 to Bournemouth, a 2-0 to Arsenal, and a 1-0 to Leicester City in the past month. This combined with many other defects in the Chelsea team have seen the club struggle a bit under Sarri. The former Napoli boss started the season well going 13 games unbeaten before a 3-1 defeat to Tottenham in the last week of November.
Since then nothing has gone right for either for the Blues or Maurizio Sarri, but there is one main problem that they need to fix – defensive issues. With Chelsea conceding 13 goals in their last 13 games, including four on Wednesday night. Things will only get worse going forward, and the main culprit has been the former PSG star – David Luiz.
The Brazilian has struggled over the last few weeks. While his passing has been impeccable, his defending, on the other hand, has been terrible. Against Bournemouth alone, the 31-year-old was at fault for at least three goals, which included presenting the ball to David Brooks for the Cherries’ second goal. However, at the same time, against this young and rather speedy front-line, Luiz looked out of place and struggled to keep up.
That can be said for the defeats to Arsenal, Tottenham and even Leicester City when the Brazilian had been singled out as the worst defender on the pitch. That begs the question, with Andreas Christensen sitting on the bench, why hasn’t Maurizio Sarri dropped Luiz for the younger Dane, something that his predecessor Antonio Conte did?
The 22-year-old is itching to prove himself to Sarri and show that he can be his sweeper, but so far changes have been far and few from the manager.
Unlike Luiz, who has played all but one Premier League fixture this season, Christensen has been warming the bench, making just one appearance in the Premier League. The 22-year-old is match-fit though, having played in all six Europa League fixtures, both the FA Cup ties and all but one Carabao Cup games so far this season.
For Chelsea, if they are to improve defensively to start with, Sarri should replace Luiz with Christensen and allow the youngster to gel with Antonio Rudiger at the back. If the manager stays adamant and doesn’t make the required alterations, we might see the Blues’ season going out of hand very soon.
