The Blues manager Maurizio Sarri has advice midfielder N’golo Kante not to deviate from his new position despite the loss against Tottenham Hotspur last weekend.
Chelsea tasted their first defeat of the season against local London rivals Tottenham Hotspur on Sunday as Spurs ran riot at Wembley. The final scoreline ended 3-1 but it could have been a lot worse for Sarri’s men as Tottenham looked rampant and were tearing Chelsea apart.
Blues’ boss Sarri couldn’t hide his disappointment and stated N’Golo Kante shouldn’t have changed his position during the game as a box to box midfielder. The Italian urged the World Cup winner to stick near Jorginho and shouldn’t ply his trade as a central midfielder. Chelsea faces another derby against Fulham on Sunday but the 59-year-old master tactician does not want Kante shifting out of position.
While speaking to Sky Sports, Sarri said, “I want to play as a center midfielder with a very technical player. For me, the center midfielder is Jorginho or (Cesc) Fabregas. I don’t want Kante in this position. Kante in the last match wanted to solve the match after the first 15 minutes but in the wrong way. He lost the position; he attacked too much the other box. And I think this one is not one of the best characteristics of Kante. It was only a reaction to the difficulties.”
Sarri went on to explain Kante’s role, “Kante has to stay near to Jorginho, especially when the ball is on the other side, It depends on the action. If the ball is on the left, we have (Marcos) Alonso, (Eden) Hazard, (Mateo) Kovacic, (Ross) Barkley, so in that situation, he has to stay very close to Jorginho I have a meeting of five or 10 minutes with the individuals, individual meetings with the players, I want to see we learned our lessons.”
Chelsea overcame PAOK 4-0 in the Europa League on Thursday night as the Blues progressed unscathed through their group. Chelsea’s unbeaten streak finally came to an end last week. Their midfield lacked a bit to deliver a pinch of quality and essence of pace and predominately N’golo Kante came under the spotlight. However, Kante is still arguably the best defensive midfielder in the world at the moment and Spurs loss could bring Blues back to the reality.
