Pep Guardiola has urged Chelsea's new owners to give Graham Potter time at Stamford Bridge ahead of Wednesday night's Carabao Cup clash with Manchester City at the Etihad Stadium.
“If Chelsea accept my humble advice, give him [Graham Potter] time and he will do well," Guardiola said on Tuesday. "They got good results but the way they play, when I saw the game against Brighton that they lost, I saw many things I remember from his period in Brighton.
“But he needs time, everybody needs time. No one has success from day one or two, I’ve a lot of admiration for his work.”
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Potter has faced heavy criticism in recent weeks after seeing his strong start at Chelsea derailed by consecutive Premier League defeats to his former club Brighton and league leaders Arsenal. That poor run is not aided by two draws preceding it against Manchester United and Brentford which means a winless run of four.
The mood around Stamford Bridge is pretty poor on the eve of a World Cup break with the looming threat of more misery pilled on with games against Manchester City and Newcastle.
Guardiola was afforded time at Manchester City to reconstruct his squad thanks to the significant investment that has led to four league titles in six years. The first season under Guardiola is likely forgotten now given the subsequent success but it was abnormally poor in Guardiola's illustrious career. In many ways, his first year in Manchester mirrored recent Chelsea performances in the Premier League.
A final-day win at Watford was needed to secure Champions League qualification and a third-placed finish - 15 points behind Antonio Conte's title-winning Chelsea side in the 2016/17 campaign. That was despite a pretty decent spend across the summer and winter transfer windows for an estimated £170million cost, bringing in Ilkay Gundogan, Leroy Sane, John Stones, Gabriel Jesus, Claudio Bravo, Nolito and Oleksandr Zinchenko.
A bright start of six wins signalled a title push but that derailed over the festive period with defeats to Chelsea, Leicester, Liverpool and finally, an emphatic 4-0 defeat at Goodison Park to Everton. By the end of his first season, there were not grand signs of vast improvement, but he was backed again in the following transfer window to evolve the squad, mainly focusing on full-backs.
Kyle Walker, Danilo and Benjamin Mendy were added along with Bernardo Silva, Ederson and Aymeric Laporte in another notable January addition. That was the season the power dynamic in the league radically shifted, with City breaking the 100-point league record.
Although Guardiola's elite coaching coupled with City's significant wealth is a pairing few others can match, the idea of patience should not be lost under Todd Boehly at Chelsea. Liverpool is probably a more realistic comparison given Jurgen Klopp came in after the 2015/16 season started and did not win his first piece of silverware until 2019 - the end of his fourth season in charge.
There seems to be little appetite around Stamford Bridge for patience or optimism at the current moment but Guardiola's logic is sound.
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