Chelsea’s owners prove their competence, says Simon Jordan

Chelsea’s decision to ditch Mauricio Pochettino and line up Enzo Maresca as his replacement has given more ammunition to those who belittle the club’s new owners and consider them clueless.

Once again I find myself trying to give nuance and context to the plight of owners. 

This may be because I was one but I find it a tad one-dimensional and myopic that there isn’t more balance and informed opinion on what is required in running a football club. 

It’s binary – you are either good or bad with nothing in between and, like most things, it is much more complicated than that.

But there is a school of thought that despite making mistakes – like everyone does – Todd Boehly, Behdad Eghbali and Co. might actually know what they’re doing after all. 

It might just be that a few frogs have to be kissed and there’s a slightly longer wait for success than the instant gratification that is often demanded these days.

Whether it’s their recruitment policy, transfer spending or talk of all-star games, Chelsea’s new owners have been widely ridiculed since they bought the club. 

But it’s people who never try anything that always point the finger at those who make mistakes.

The new owners have overseen a massive cultural change at Stamford Bridge after a change of ownership was forced upon Chelsea by its previous owner being a cohort of a war criminal and there were always going to be bumps in the road.

A lot of the criticism seems a little unfair to me. Their transfer dealings and seeming propensity to chase potential will of course not sit well with the ‘here and now’ mob. 

Then there’s the data model that is often ridiculed and queried as if it is the sole basis of their thinking – even though it produced the very players that Brighton have used so successfully and Chelsea subsequently bought.

But that’s simply wrong, a classic case of people always wanting to take things to extremes. Of course they use data but there is a bit more to it than that. 

When you’re buying a house you survey it properly, so with transfer committees, you’ve got people analysing and evaluating and using intelligence to overlay, not determine, decisions. That seems like a pretty sound way of operating to me.

Then there’s the football orthodoxy that the manager needs to buy the players. Yes, managers need to have input but most of the time they don’t want to put their name to the latest multi-million transfer in case it blows up in their face anyway. 

So how about they do something revolutionary like actually coaching players to be better?

Another criticism is the level of spend. Well, yes they’ve spent lot of money and the headline figure in excess of £1billion is always rolled out as proof they don’t know what they’re doing. But let’s be fair here. 

They also sold an awful lot of players so the net spend is more like £600m which, while certainly considerable, is not out of the ordinary for Chelsea. 

Roll back to 2003 and factor in inflation and it’s not dissimilar to what Chelsea spent then – although that spending did soon translate to silverware. 

You can also take individual soundbites from Boehly speaking to business forums in Qatar or wherever and suggest that perhaps he should keep quiet but what you can’t argue with is he and his people have come here to be successful. 

Yes there have been two years of steep learning and missteps but you have to let their belief system flow through. 

More often than not in life, if you want someone to be effective in something, you are well served in looking at their track record of success and then hoping the lessons they need to learn are quickly understood.

There have been suggestions that Chelsea simply want a manager who will toe the line, something Pochettino, who is in part responsible for his own demise, was perhaps not prepared to do. 

But what does that mean? Is it sticking to what you agreed to, understanding the principle of your contract and not utilising the media the moment you don’t like something? 

That’s not toeing the line, that’s basic common sense, an implicit understanding that there is a relationship between employer and employee.

By all accounts, Maresca was very impressive in his interview. His diligence, deep knowledge of the squad and his preparedness to work with the club’s existing players is believed to have convinced the owners.

I don’t know enough about him as a personality but speaking to Leicester’s Marc Albrighton last week, he revealed that the players thought Maresca was a revelation in terms of the sessions he put on, the training regime, the discipline, the attention to detail. 

Naysayers will point to the wobble Leicester suffered as they chased promotion but you’re going to have wobbles in the Championship – it’s probably the most difficult division in world football to get out of. 

But despite that, they still racked up 97 points to win the title. 

So he did a great job, managed the downturn of people’s perspectives, oversaw player departures and displayed the pedigree, capability and hallmarks of someone that can develop into a top manager. 

It is a risk but so were Mikel Arteta and Xabi Alonso. Chelsea have alighted on someone they consider a progressive, evaluative coach that has chops to be able to manage. 

He must have given them the confidence during his interview that he possesses the capacity and ability to deal with the vagaries and challenges at Chelsea.

Whilst the media will say Chelsea have burned through four managers in two years, there have only really been two appointments really. 

Thomas Tuchel was inherited and discarded for other reasons while Frank Lampard was an interim ‘hold-the-fort’ man after Graham Potter – who looked like a rabbit in the headlights – and then there Pochettino. 

So this is third time lucky for Chelsea’s owners. If they haven’t learnt the lessons of their first two appointments by now, then perhaps they’re never going to learn them. 

But I’d like to think there’s been a lot of intelligence, a lot of thought, consideration and deliberation behind their thinking with blueprints about what they want, why they want it and what they’re hoping to achieve. A word of warning though. 

If this goes pear-shaped, then fingers need to point and questions need to be asked of sporting directors Paul Winstanley and Laurence Stewart. This has to be the last chance saloon for them.

If they for their part get this one wrong, then it can’t just be about the manager, it has to be about the people who made the decision too. 

If this doesn’t work out then they have to go too and the ownership model needs to take a serious look at what it’s doing because if they keep making the same mistakes with the same outcomes, then it is you, Todd and Co. who are the fools.

Southgate ditched sentiment and now England must win 

England are going to this summer’s tournament in Germany to win.

I know that sounds like I’m stating the bleeding obvious but this feels different to previous years.

I like the decisions Gareth Southgate has made over selection. He has picked a squad that’s capable of winning it and removed sentimentality. 

This is business mode now as proven by the decision to leave Marcus Rashford and Jordan Henderson out of the squad. 

I’m very optimistic about England’s chances. Not because I want to create pressure for Southgate, or so I can call him out if they fail, but because I think they’re ready to go.

I expect us to win it and I suspect Southgate expects that too.

He has two of the world’s best players at his disposal in Harry Kane and Jude Bellingham. He has a litany of talent such as Phil Foden, Bukayo Saka and Declan Rice ripping up the Premier League as well as arguably the world’s best right back in Kyle Walker. 

No one can really legitimately boast a stronger pool of players than us.

I’ll be interested to see how Southgate has evolved when things aren’t going our way and changes need to be made at key moments because the difference between whether we win this tournament or fall short will be down to him and the decisions he makes at key times.

There is no international team at these Euros who are better than us so this is about the mentality of the coach and what he infuses in his players.

If Southgate is as bold and forthright as he was in his decision-making in picking his squad, then I think we’ll win it.

Cup win shouldn’t save Ten Hag 

Manchester United papered over the cracks with their FA Cup win against Manchester City. 

The players were possibly primarily motivated by potentially playing for their futures rather than for Erik ten Hag. 

One swallow does not make a summer and, if Jim Ratcliffe and the Glazers had made their mind up over sacking the Dutchman before Wembley, they cannot be swayed by a piece of silverware.