Ian Wright was confused with Graham Potter's tactics as his Chelsea side were beaten 4-1 at Brighton on Saturday afternoon.
Potter, on his first return to the AMEX Stadium after leaving the club in September, started with Raheem Sterling and Christian Pulisic as the two wing-backs, with Marc Cucurella as one of the three centre-backs. Ben Chilwell and Cesar Azpilicueta were both named on the bench despite being natural defensive-minded players and perhaps better suited for the wing-back roles.
It isn't the first time that Potter has decided to play attacking players in that position, having done it against Chelsea and in the clash with Salzburg on Tuesday night. Interestingly, it didn't work on either occasion and Potter had to switch up his tactics at half-time.
Chelsea were subsequently hammered by the Seagulls, with Leandro Trossard and Pascal Gross contributing to a first win in charge for Roberto De Zerbi, while Trevor Chalobah and Ruben Loftus-Cheek both put the ball in their own net.
Asked what went wrong for Chelsea, Wright said on BBC's Match of the Day: "Well the wing-backs. We’ve seen they’ve used a variety of wing-backs this season and when you look at their bench they've got [Cesar] Azpilicueta and Ben Chilwell.
"But they started with Pulisic and Sterling and I found that very confusing. And when you watch what they do, and when you look at the positions they were taking up, they weren’t really helping Chalobah or Cucurella or Thiago Silva. And what was happening was they [the three centre-backs] were getting pulled all over the place."
Did Graham Potter make too many changes in Chelsea's defeat at Brighton? Let us know in the comments below!
Meanwhile, Martin Keown also agreed with Wright and slammed Potter for his set-up. It was a miserable first return for Potter to the South Coast, with Kai Havertz finding the net for Chelsea's only goal.
Keown told the BBC : "Chelsea looked unrecognisable at the back. I think there were too many changes.
"It counts against you in this situation because you are trying to formulate partnership and it’s always changing at the back. It was a different back three today. They are wing-backs that aren’t wing-backs. They played Raheem Sterling in a wing-back position today and I don’t think it suited in the way they played.
"Maybe Graham Potter was trying to be too clever. Keep it the same and football is a simple game."
After the game, Potter cited the absence of key personnel for having to rotate at this early stage of his Chelsea reign. Reece James, Wesley Fofana and Kalidou Koulibaly have missed matches in recent weeks.
He said: "It’s not about change. You need to find a way to win and perform. We’ve had a lot of games in October and an incredible schedule."So for different reasons, we’ve lost key players in terms of Reece [James], [Kalidou] Koulibaly, [Wesley] Fofana and [N’Golo] Kante. So there is a constant challenge in how to set up."
