Norwich City vs Chelsea - Mourinho magic does the trick

Chelsea arrived at Carrow road looking in good shape after a 4-0 win midweek in Bucharest, and were expected to pick up all 3 points against a Norwich side that had scored only twice in 5 outings. After a crisp beginning which saw the Blues take the lead after just 4 minutes, a little spell in between allowed Norwich to compete shoulder to shoulder, as they eventually grabbed a goal back through Antony Pilkington’s fine header. In the end, the 3-1 victory flattered to deceive, but Mourinho’s tactics turned around what liked like yet another failed away outing for the Blues.

The Blues began in their conventional 4-2-3-1 shape, Mata in a wide position on the right, Oscar featuring in the centre as the creative fulcrum, and Andre Schuerrle, who wrecked havoc on Wednesday night playing on the left. The initial few plays made Chelsea’s intentions explicitly clear, utilize Ba’s runs to get long balls into dangerous areas. Mourinho recognized that Olsson’s blistering pace at full back would be hard to come up against, so he targeted the centre defensive duo of Bassong and Turner.

Ba positioned himself early on in between the two centre halves, effectively free to make a run without a marker immediately pressurizing him. Unsurprisingly, it was the long ball that unlocked Norwich, Frank Lampard’s lofted pass picked out Ba’s well timed run , as he out-muscled Bassong before laying it off to Oscar, who executed a beautiful trivela into the bottom right corner. The long ball continued to be played forward at every opportunity in the first half, Luiz and Lampard peppering balls into the box for Ba to chase who looked bright in only his second start under Mourinho.

The passing game in general worked very well in the first half, Mata’s movement into central positions saw him link up well with Oscar, the Spaniard passing 14 times to Mata (the highest interchange amongst any two players on the pitch.) And it was in the 14^th minute that Mata found himself in a delightful position in the middle, as he dinked a lovely ball through for Ba, whose effort was tipped away excellently by Ruddy. Mata completed 93% of his passes in the first half, but contributed almost nothing defensively, with no interceptions, no tackles and no clearances made in the entire game.

Norwich caught the hint, seeing Mata’s reluctance to drop combined with his roaming around the pitch they pushed on, which resulted in a good spell that saw them almost score. Suddenly the long ball wasn’t as prominent a part of the play as the first 5 minutes, and the more regular short passing game came into play.

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Mata’s heat map shows his all round forays over the length of the pitch, and his negligible patches in his own half to help out defensively. This is where Norwich caught on, Fer and Howson exploited spaces to bring a good spell of Norwich pressure. The second tactical change though came shortly after Norwich equalized in the 68^th minute. Mourinho often employed a strategy of finishing with two forwards, but considering Fernando Torres’ injury/suspension and Eto’o’s inability to play direct football, he was forced to change his tactic. And change it around he did.

Just 5 minutes after conceding, Eto’o came on for Ba at centre forward. In the next 5 minutes, Ashley Cole came off for Eden Hazard and Willian came on for his debut for Mata. This made it effectively 3 men at the back, Luiz, Terry and Ivanovic in the middle with Schuerrle and Willian functioning as wing backs. Schuerrle’s stamina and tactical discipline plus Willian’s fresh legs got Chelsea back on the up almost immediately, as 5 men in midfield effectively added two extra men to deal with for Norwich. Andre Schuerrle’s heat map shows the winger’s desire to do his defensive duties, as well as helping Hazard create openings in the other half on the pitch.

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Also, considering Olsson was at left back, Chelsea targeted the other flank, Schuerrle, Oscar, Hazard and Eto’o all finding passing opportunities and combinations on that wing in the last 11 minutes.

10 minutes later, the pressure finally told. Norwich got caught out during an offensive corner, and Willian headed the ball to Oscar, whose long pass (again) found Hazard after Bassong failed to clear his lines. The same long ball tactic which asked Ba to make a run beyond the line was effective yet again, signaling Mourinho’s intentions to use root one football to force swift attacking transitions. The first substitution had done its trick, Chelsea were now ahead.

The third goal came a minute later, but was more down to pure quality than tactical brilliance. Samuel Eto’o drove hard towards the centre but lost the ball to a heavy touch, as Willian, Chelsea’s second sub on the day stepped up to curl in an absolute beauty with his weaker foot into the top right corner. Chelsea were now out of reach, Chris Houghton looked inconsolable, and rightly so, as Chelsea’s below average performance was saved the blushes by two moments of magic by Oscar, and more importantly an instrumental tactical switch and two perfect substitutions by Jose Mourinho.

Mourinho’s willingness to experiment has seen Chelsea employ an astounding variety of tactical philosophies. Playing a false 9 against Manchester United with Andre Schuerrle, finishing with two forwards numerous times, indicates that Mourinho not only has an armory of options up his sleeve, but that he is more than willing to use them.