Conte dodged a bullet with Carroll
THERE seems little sense in Chelsea’s transfer business this window. They made a late run for Alexis Sanchez but also for Andy Carroll, a limited centre forward who needs the ball delivered along route one and is injury prone. Now out for a month, how was he meant to link up with Eden Hazard or Cesc Fabregas? Would Chelsea’s midfield have been told to go direct? Antonio Conte wanted Carroll to solve Chelsea’s goalscoring problem, but how could he do that? Carroll has scored three goals since finding the net at Southampton on February 4 last year — and two of them came in one game against West Brom. He has made two scoring appearances in his last 20 matches and, this season, has picked up more than three times as many yellow cards as goals. Michy Batshuayi may have been far from impressive since arriving at Stamford Bridge but he scored as many in one night against Nottingham Forest in the EFL Cup as Carroll has for West Ham in close to a year. How was such a player to be the answer to a scoring drought?