Chelsea's Front Three Fireworks

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0:34Hello and welcome into the latest edition of ESPN FC. Kay Murray, Craig Burley and Stevie Nicholl here in the studio kicking things off with Monday Night Football at Craven Cottage where Fulham took on Chelsea. And Chelsea's front three all scored in the 3-2 win for Xavi Alonso's men. However, Fulham got two of their own, Josh King and Gonzalo Garcia, on the score sheet and some questions of Chelsea goalkeeper Robert Sanchez. One of the negatives for Chelsea on the night was Cole Palmer having to come off in the 82nd minute. We'll see how that plays out. As we do welcome in Frank Leboff. Let's actually start there, shall we, Craig?

1:11Because he'd look good. You could tell he'd been rested this summer. And then that happened. Rested? You mean dropped? Dropped this summer. Yeah. And then this happens, yeah. Positives for Chelsea. It's a win away from home, particularly, but first game of the season. Goal for Morgan Rodgers. Big signing in the summer. Goal for João Pedro. who should have gone to the World Cup with Brazil. Ridiculous decision to take the likes of Neymar in his current state of fitness, and João Pedro left at home. So maybe a point to prove there. And Cole Palmer, as you mentioned, we saw Phil Foden at the weekend playing for Man City, looking to sort of, you know, take that second part of his career and kick on again.

1:48And I think Cole Palmer's in the same situation. A player who has, maybe a year or two ago, was the go-to player for England and for Chelsea. who was just doing so many great things and then for whatever reason lost his way a little bit, whether it was a change of shape in the team or change of manager or whatever it was. Talk about him. Maybe he wanted to go back up north. That's gone away. And for the first game of the season, he had everything that the Cole Palmer of a year or so ago had. He was sharp. Every time he got on the ball, he dropped a shoulder, picked a pass, scored a goal, did lots of good things.

2:24Unfortunately, he looked as if he had a little injury coming off. But that's a big positive. A couple of days ago we were talking saying Xabi Alonso was really good at Leverkusen, at making Florian Vils his playmaker. And not just building the team around him, but finding a way to get the best out of Florian Vils. And we were saying if he can find a way to get the best out of Cole Palmer, it's going to go a long way to maybe mask over some of the other issues in this Chelsea side that we're going to talk about. So that was one of two or three really big positives for Xabi Alonso today. Doesn't seem to be many issues in the final third at the moment for Chelsea.

3:03No, dream. Absolute dream for any coach. You want your goal scorer, obviously that's usually your centre-forward, but your other playmakers to either be assisting or scoring goals as well. And to have your front three all score, away from home, three goals. Thanks very much. I mean, that's just a dream. Unfortunately There are two sides to the game And the other side is defensively And yes, clearly Looking at the highlights We have pinpointed Sanchez But at the same time We've got to pinpoint the back three He is playing with a back three And Lacroix, I think is the only one That's really used to it Colliwell and Achipong I don't think are used to that particularly So they're going to have to figure that out Because that could have cost them two points The chance that Anthony Robinson had Is just a shambles defensively And when you've got three centre-backs There has to be somebody there I mean, where they were, I really don't know You saw the size of the hole that the ball was cleared into And then, of course, Sanchez Absolute no man's land I mean, really, he was lucky Otherwise, really, you could maybe Stick a finger at him For what could have been three goals So, yeah, going that way, fantastic.

4:23Going that way, not good enough. Of course, La Croix at Crystal Palace was in a very well-drilled back three that Oliver Glasner had played for quite some time. He had Mark Gay on one side, he had Chris Richards on the other and they played together for a long time. So this is going to be a little bit of a work in progress in terms of, I don't know what the personnel in the end will be. It'll be La Croix and whoever it is. But whatever it is, the goalkeeper is an issue. And it has been an issue for quite some time. So a lot of positives. But if you're a Chelsea fan at this game or leaving Craven Cottage tonight, you'd be saying, yeah, a lot to look forward to.

5:01But I tell you what, I'm worried about the goalkeeper. I think that'll be a lot of conversation amongst the Chelsea fans. He lost 52 goals last year, pretty much, Sanchez. Now, obviously there are players in front of him. But 52 goals in a season, it's not good enough if you want to be challenging for the Premier League. So Chelsea start the season with a win, Frank. And of course, that is a positive. But how do you feel about the goalkeeper in the defence right now? Well, shaky, as everybody else. And when you're a defender, you know at the back that you don't have a Barthez or, I don't know, a great goalkeeper.

5:38You don't feel confident. And therefore, you get shaky. We see on the second goal, Caldwell should have gone on the ball with a header and didn't. And behind, you know, you have nobody to save you. when you make a mistake. And it's hard to be a goalkeeper because you have nobody behind you. But we know Sanchez. We have known him for a while. And we know that he can do mistakes. But when you play for a club like Chelsea and when you see what they do offensively, and Craig was mentioning it, when it was perfect, the three guys at the front, and as Stevie said, you know, three goals from the three at front, away from home, that's great.

6:15But you cannot waste that by making such mistakes. King's goal yeah it's a good shot but why do you open up first first pass you have to be there you have to control that you cannot consider goal on that side you can consider goal on the other side and it's impossible you play for Chelsea that's what it is and there is an issue and Xabi Alonso has to find somebody else really very quickly because that's been an issue for a while and we don't want to see that anymore. We all do respect for Sanchez. We tried. It doesn't work. And when it's important, he's not there to save the club. So, yeah, they have to find another one.

7:02But I was very pleased, by the way, by Lacroix and how he settled down and even work on offensively, gave an assist, but he was strong at the back as well. Hopefully, Colwell can follow and they can make a good pair. But if they play a three, it's going to take a little while to adjust because on the two sides that's not very nice. Go on. No, he had success at Leverkusen not all the time but a lot of the time playing that back three. Lacroix was in the French squad and played in the World Cup. That's how good he was at Crystal Palace albeit Alexi Canati had been struggling for form. But I think on a positive side you're licking your chops if you've got Cole Palmer in that kind of mindset.

7:44And not only that But, you know, the load has sort of lifted a little bit on João Pedro because Morgan Rodgers is there now. Morgan Rodgers, who he'll be making those runs from a little deeper. You know, he's a powerful player. He's a strong runner with the ball. So all of a sudden, you're sort of multifaceted in terms of your attack. Last year, it was, you know, two wide players, you know, Pedro Neto, Santos, or even maybe Garnaccio at times, which was totally inconsistent. And a lot of times, João Pedro, because Coparman wasn't playing particularly well, Joe Pedro was trying to do a lot of it on his own.

8:18If he can get that help from Palmer, he'll certainly get it from Rodgers. Rodgers is always going to be making those runs, getting into the box late, getting on the end of things, driving forward. Stevie was saying during the game, it just does look a little strange in a blue jersey. It does look a little weird, but he's made this big move now. They've all scored on their debut. So, Chabby Alonso knows what he's getting pretty much from those guys up front. what he doesn't know is what his midfield balance is going to be and what his back line is going to be. But I think, ultimately, if Chelsea are going to have a really, really good season, I think they will have to go, a bit like Tottenham, really.

8:57I mean, Tottenham are going to have to sign a goalkeeper. I mean, that was a disaster at the weekend for them. But Kinski's not good enough. And as Frank said, we've seen the movie with Robert Sanchez now. He'll do some great things, but they're outweighed with all the bad stuff he does, whether it's with the ball at his feet or the saves that he should have made tonight that he didn't make. That's not going to keep somebody like Chabu Alonso in the job. So, interesting to see if they go and sign somebody between now and the end of the transfer window in that position because I think they really need to.

9:29Sanchez is one of those guys that gets the manager sacked. You're ready to drop him and he makes a worldie and you think, oh, he's going to turn the corner. It's just like a cycle. and it doesn't look like changing and the only way it's going to change is if you change the person. Well, we're one round in so obviously it would be very early to make any huge assumptions right now in terms of the title race but there has been a bit of movement with the odds after the first round. So Arsenal still head and shoulders above the rest but then Man City behind them and it's Chelsea who've moved up to third place right now.

10:02That's a head scratcher, isn't it? Why are Liverpool still there? Why are the bookies... Why do the bookies Still have Liverpool up there. Chelsea moved ahead of Liverpool with this result. Yeah, but even looking at that, Liverpool are sitting fourth favourites. Why? Somebody tell me why, please. Can you help me? Because there are actually not that many good teams. Arsenal apart, we're all getting what we thought we may get in match day one. Well, I say that. We knew Liverpool still had some issues at the back. We were maybe a little surprised by Man Utd or a lot surprised by Man United, but that was, again, you're taking the back a little bit with that.

10:46Chelsea's far, look, it's quite simple. The only team that are even close to being the finished article are Arsenal. The only one. The rest of them, they're all dancing around in the dark trying to figure out with either a new manager or new players or whatever it is. And if I'm Arsenal, you know, and I think it's Theo Walcott who was on the other night on the show. said the only thing that's going to be in Arsenal's way you'd imagine at the moment is Arsenal itself. Because they are the strongest team, they're the strongest squad. By a stretch, by a long stretch. Now, things can change. Of course they can change and it's very, very early.

11:26But it's hard to see, A, where Arsenal, even after one game, where they're going to trip up and where the rest are going to really steamroller all the rest of the teams in the league. It's hard to see that. We've sat here over the weekend and we've spoken about City and we've spoken about Chelsea today and we've spoken about Liverpool. Man United. And Man United and we've sat here for... Villa got walloped. Between five and ten minutes talking about the things that they need to get better at. And then when we spoke about Arsenal the other day, it took us about 30 seconds to come up with something.

12:00Or to come up with a reason why they might struggle. That's how far ahead they are. We agree with this, Frank. You know what? Yes. You know what? I was thinking about why the guy was talking that we did during the former show that we were absolutely right. We're not that bad. We're pretty good at predicting stuff, you know. Maybe it's too obvious. But really, everything we said last week before the first day has been has been shown by all the clubs that Arsenal, they're strong, spot on. They know what they do and the other they don't know. Well, when I saw the goal after 30 seconds from Giro Pedro, I said, whoa, whoa, whoa, he's getting good.

12:40Well, I know after 15 minutes, I go the other way and I understood that they were strong in some other parts. So they're still working on the process. He's still there and maybe they can be better, of course, and we all hope that. But one club is already ready, is Arsenal. The other one is Brentford. Brentford are ready. They know what they do. They exactly know what they have to do. And they shoot it against Spurs. Absolutely fantastic. We know that it's going to be hard all season long to be consistent and everything. But they can surprise. Because the others, they're not very good. So far, nothing good enough for me to pretend to even finish in second.

13:24So hopefully for the Blues, for Chelsea, they're going to be strong at front and everything's going to work. but really right now everything we predicted is happening this is the easiest season for a while to pick a Premier League winner isn't it it's a bit like Germany in a sense isn't it in the Bundesliga it's like I've not been facetious who's not picked Bayern Munich I know Leverkusen won the league when Alonso was there but who picked Leverkusen at the start of the season it happened but it was an anomaly doesn't normally happen normally you go round everybody and most networks will say Bayern Munich I haven't heard one person yet tell me maybe there is somebody out there that said Man City or Liverpool or Chip maybe there is but I think most people with common sense everybody's just gone to Arsenal and then they're figuring out the rest where they're all going to finish and maybe it won't finish like that I don't know, I mean I imagine it will but that's not a good place to be for the Premier League if Arsenal are going to run away with this it's very early but I'm looking at the rest of them and I include Man City at the weekend who could easily have lost to Bournemouth at home who's going to put the fight up?

14:36Spending all this money but who's going to put the fight up? I think the early signs are it could be a little concerning in terms of the competitive edge of the Premier League if Arsenal continue to look as dominant as they are albeit they play the side that were recently promoted at home in Coventry there's going to be a lot tougher tests but I think everybody looking at their squad and what they did last year knows that the others are going to have to plug some huge gaps to make that difference. So this could be, could be a bit of a runaway Premier League season. Yeah, and it's only round one.

15:09Gavin Jules were talking about it on the latest version of their podcast. Check that out right now wherever you get your pods.

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15:51Julien Alvarez was loudly whistled by home fans at the Metropolitano on Sunday when his name was announced ahead of the game and when he came on. Bit of an odd situation at the end of the game too when the players gathered on the pitch to salute the supporters. Julien Alvarez ends up walking off down the tunnel on his own and after the game he learned that this was a club decision. That's when we heard from Diego Simeone speaking after the game on both front pages of the Spanish market and us today say, Unforgiven. Here is Diego Simeone. The club decided that he didn't come to greet his friends, and that the decision was not from Julian Alvarez, but from the club who took the decision to leave him and separate him so he came to the dressing room.

16:40Sid Lowe is joining us now. Frank Leboeff is still with us. Sid, you were at this game. I know that this is your copy. this week for the Guardian as well and I don't think you even had enough words to say everything that went down at the Metropolitano so here you go you've got more words now with us. Well I mean I think the starting point of course is that the intensity the consistency of the whistling is something I don't think I've seen before that much of a stadium to be on a player for the entire game in that way and then as you say that the really striking one was the was the moment at the end of the game when he walked off on his own and now I think what the club at least on the surface were trying to do was to protect him from even more whistles so he doesn't go to that end of the stadium where the where the more hardcore fans are that he doesn't have to face up to that and he walks off the off the pitch and down the tunnel on his own but of course what that does rather than protecting him is expose him and i think what it does is it highlights that this is a problem that really doesn't have an easy solution that the things are really really broken and we're in a situation now in which everybody is stuck and the solution isn't a good one.

17:40Barcelona would like to sign Julien Alvarez. Julien Alvarez would like to go to Barcelona. But Atletico Madrid say he's not for sale. And particularly not for sale to Barcelona. Now I think if Atletico Madrid felt that they could get a good offer for him from someone outside of Spain, then they would be perfectly happy to do that given the situation. But of course, he would need to agree to that and at the moment he's not doing so. And the word is, Sid, that he's been targeted by Arsenal right now and that he has spoken to Mikel Arteta. Has there been any talk about that in Spain? Now this is a recurring theme in Spain the possibility that Arsenal are the solution to this but the problem with that is twofold first of all obviously Arsenal would have to put together a package that Atletico Madrid found agreeable and they would have to be very convinced that Julien Alvarez was the right player for them and of course he wouldn't be coming cheap the other is of course they would have to think very hard I think about whether or not they feel that this is the right move not just in terms of Julien Alvarez's ability not just in terms of how well he fits into the team but do we want a player who we know is holding out for Barcelona, who we know isn't necessarily that keen to play in England, and what kind of mindset would he be in if he comes here?

18:46And then, of course, related to that, there's the very simple point, which is, do you persuade him to come in the first place? Does he want to, or does he keep holding out in the hope, almost certainly a forlorn hope, that something can be done with Barcelona? I think, in a way, you look at the things that have been said, you look at the accusations that have been thrown, you look at the amount of pride that is at stake here as well, the sense that Atletico Madrid have of this not just being about saying we don't want to sell Julian Alvarez. This is about we're not going to allow you to try and manipulate us and manoeuvre us into a position.

19:17And we're going to turn this into a cause, not just a player. And I think that's one of the reasons why this has a very, very difficult outcome now to fully predict. Except that on the face of it, right now, with eight days still to go in the transfer window, they're going to have to fix things because he's probably going to end up staying. You know, the Arsenal thing that Sid talked about there is kind of spot on. You know, somewhere like Arsenal or a club of similar ilk, not in Spain, would be the option that gets him away from the vitriol and out of that club, but not the option that he wants.

19:50And that's a difficult scenario for both the player and the buying club, that you're really just getting the guy out, but not getting the guy to go where he really wants to go, because he really wants to go to Barcelona. And even the reports in London say he's softening his stance. I mean, I don't... Ced knows more about this whole mess than we do because he's on the ground. But... He's not the first player that ever wants to leave... has wanted to leave a club. These things happen. I think it's just a stance now. It looks like a stance from Atletico Madrid, as Ced said, is that we're not the pawn here and just selling to our rivals because you want to go there.

20:32And it's just a game of bluff and counter bluff now. So it's a messy situation. And you're going to end up with a player, if the transfer window closes, staying, that the fans are not going to forget about it. The manager's going to end up probably using them to a certain extent. And the atmosphere around that, I mean, the atmosphere I would imagine with the players, where the players should be fine because these things go on all the time. But what's coming from the stands and from the car park and outside the ground around the scenario will make it very vitriolic. And you do feel that there has to be an endgame here that suits everybody involved.

21:16Otherwise, it could be a bit of a mockery on their season having a player of that stature getting whistled and booed everywhere he goes. It's not a good scene. I could understand them taking him out The firing line In some ways that makes sense, right? But with eight days to go in the transfer market And the only team that are interested You're not letting them go You've made it clear pretty much That you're not going to let them go anyway So not having him standing with the rest of the players Is making it worse Hiding him away isn't going to change anything He's going to have to face it You've got a situation like this.

21:57With eight days to go, the likelihood of him moving is pretty small. So they're going to have to get through it. And you know that Semi only wants to use him. Because the guy's a good putter. He's arguably the best forward they have. But hiding him away isn't going to help it. He's going to have to stand on the field. And he's going to have to face them. And eventually it'll calm down. But it's not going to calm down if you keep hiding him away. So they haven't done him any favours in my opinion. by what they did. It just looked awful and made it worse. Frank, the other day you said let him go, but if letting him go means to Barcelona, is that really the best solution for Atleti?

22:37No, of course not. And Atleti is responsible for nothing in that matter. Julien Vares engaged the conversation during the World Cup saying that he wanted to go to Barcelona. And that was his mistake. He has a contract, and you should respect the contract that you signed. And and therefore fans are very upset and they have the right to boo you because you betrayed them. That's what it is That's the reality of it, but I'm with Stevie As soon as that city decided to keep him yeah Let's celebrate with her with the other players who salute well Salute the defense after the game even if you do Let's do that and you take it.

23:21It's gonna take a while maybe before the play the fans forgive him and before Juliano Vares give his best for the club. Remember what happened to Chrisman and I mentioned that before. He left, came back, was good and then finished as a legend as Atleti when he left last season. So maybe it's going to happen the same for Juliano Vares because there is no option. I understand Atletico Madrid not willing to give a player or to sell a player to go to a rival. That's only fair. That's only fair. So Julian Alvarez should have shut up and now they should face the reality of his actions and do what he has to do.

24:05I can't remember the whole mechanics of the Griezmann thing that Frank mentioned. What's the difference here between Atleti's stance on Julian Alvarez going to Barcelona and the Antoine Griezmann move to Barcelona, what's the difference in the mechanics of it? Well, I think part of the difference, actually, to be honest, Craig, is chronology, is the fact that this comes after the Griezmann events. And so, of course, there's a kind of a build-up effect. But I also think there's a question not just about the very fact of a player going and the fact of a player going to Barcelona, but the way in which it's been managed.

24:41There's a sense that Atletico Madrid are irritated by Barcelona's approach, irritated by the way it's been handled by Julien Alvarez and in particular by his agents, that they had essentially said to the agents, look, if at the end of the season you still think that you want to go, if you're prepared to say so, if we're prepared to do a deal, if you can bring a buying club, we can talk about it. And if that deal is serious, we will sit down and we'll negotiate it. But they didn't get that offer in time, that the comments weren't said at the right time, that things were done, they believe, at least behind their back during the season when they said, listen, wait and wait until the summer and in the summer we'll talk about it.

25:17That said, I think it's probably quite important to say this. And you three guys who've all played football will know this better than anyone. I think what happens is, of course, that clubs, when it comes to, if you like, the popular judgment of a player, the judgment made by fans, clubs have a huge advantage because they are the club. And clubs quite often work quite hard to make sure that they don't just get the deal that they want or the lack of the deal they want in this case, but they also win the narrative battle. and I think quite often clubs actually hang players out to dry and make it about them.

25:47Now, that's not to say necessarily this is what's happened here, but it is to say that clubs, I think, are conscious about the way that fans respond to sales and to sales even more than purchases. And so quite often I think what clubs want, and that's one of the things they would have certainly wanted in this case, is in the event of a player leaving, in this case, Kulian Alvarez, but it's true of any player, to be able to effectively say to the fans, nothing we could do. It wasn't our fault. Yeah, let's talk about Barcelona. Do they need him? Because he said to be their plan A, Sid. They managed without a proven reference point at the weekend to score five against Alce.

26:20Do they even need Julian Alvarez this season? Yeah, I must admit this is the way I was thinking about it. He's saying Robert Lewandowski's gone, Ferran Torres has gone, Marcus Rashford's gone. They've taken 60 goals between them. They haven't signed Julian Alvarez. They don't have a centre-forward. And in other news, they scored five this weekend. And obviously, you know, part of this is that there is an analytical side to this, which is to say that there's, I think there's an enthusiasm at Barcelona for the idea of doing something that's not enormously dissimilar to what Paris Saint-Germain do, which is to have three forwards who are all essentially wingers, who are going at you all the time, incredibly intense, very direct, very vertical running.