Three wins from 10 games and just 13 goals scored. Rewind almost a month and the Premier League campaign had started in bleak fashion for Chelsea; the criticism was loud from some sections over Mauricio Pochettino’s lack of a quick impact, highlighted all the more by Ange Postecoglou doing exactly that a few miles further north.
Yet even with a misfiring front line there had occasionally been hints of what this team could be: the beginnings of partnerships, a few players starting to settle, standing out, finding their form. In a team which has been ripped up and effectively started anew over the last year, cohesion between individuals is everything to rebuilding a style and a successful approach. Pochettino has been hampered there, too, by injuries and absences, imbalances and those who arrived before him not reaching the level hoped of them.
