For all the talk of Chelsea’s own products being whisked across Europe - not to mention half of Asia - for this unique opportunity, it was one of their imports who showed up best.
From a makeshift travelling squad that included no fewer than a dozen academy graduates, Marc Guiu did not exactly leap off the page as most likely to relish this freezing assignment. If the climate contrast between Cobham and Kazakhstan was shiver-inducing enough at the thought, then try hailing from Catalonia.
This, though, was the 18-year-old’s best night since signing from Barcelona last summer, his two early goals making another Conference League stroll from what looked a most thankless ask as the Blues beat Astana 3-1 to make it five group stage wins on the spin.
Unwearied by the eight-hour flight across five time zones, Guiu showed all the enthusiasm of last month’s eye-catching display against Heidenheim but this time, a clinical edge, too.
In Germany, the youngster might have scored five within the opening 20 minutes, but fluffed his lines each time. On this occasion, though, he struck twice with goals that will have been to Enzo Maresca’s taste for contrasting reasons.
Solo effort puts Chelsea ahead 😍
— Football on TNT Sports (@footballontnt) December 12, 2024
Marc Guiu makes an impact from the start as his marvellous run and finish puts the Blues ahead in Kazakhstan 🥶
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The first was a brilliant piece of solo craft and graft, the teenager first to suss out that on a slippery surface defending one-on-one was a near impossible task. From the right touchline, he nudged past his man and was gone, Aleksandr Marochkin unable to get any traction from a standing start as Guiu raced into the box and tucked away neatly at the near-post, past a home goalkeeper wearing a woolly hat.
The second was was an uglier goal of the poacher’s variety, a whole body thrown at Pedro Neto’s cross and some unconventional portion of its midriff forcing the ball home. Neto, only playing because he is suspended for Sunday’s Premier League meeting with Brentford, looked a frankly ridiculous cut above and was withdrawn in act of mercy - to him and Astana - at half-time.
Even within Chelsea’s youth-focused recruitment policy, Guiu was signed as very much one for the future, and that has left him in a strange position in the here and now.
Where Maresca has justified his large squad by insisting he wants two players competing for each position, Guiu is clearly third in his, behind Nicolas Jackson and Christopher Nkunku, the club’s top-scorers in the Premier League and across competitions, respectively.
As a result, even wholesale rotation has not always been enough to get Guiu a game: this was only his third start in five in the group stage and he played only 14 minutes across the Blues’s two Carabao Cup ties. He has not even made the bench in the Premier League since mid-September.
Opportunities like this, then, are important for his development because as the season progresses and the stakes, even in this competition, rise, they could decrease in supply.
