Luiz was confused, but now he is the player — and the man — for Sarri
HE might look like a man who has wandered into the building in his pyjamas, but there’s a reason why Maurizio Sarri was once entrusted with the personal wealth of customers at Tuscany’s most venerable bank.
Late on Saturday, Sarri was artfully employing that old managerial trope about his team not even warranting title discussion. He mentioned something about winning the ‘championship’ at one stage. Someone went back to him on this. He said he’d been talking about the Europa League. All nonsense, of course. Chelsea have remembered what an enjoyable working life feels like and that’s a very powerful thing.
The restoration of David Luiz is the Sarri effect in microcosm. It’s six years since Gary neville observed that Luiz defended like someone being ‘controlled by a 10-year- old on a PlayStation’, and he has been so frequently dropped and picked up by managers since then that his head must be spinning. On Saturday, you understood why Rafael Benitez was so puzzled by Jose Mourinho’s willingness to sell Luiz, after succeeding him at Stamford Bridge.
There was a goal-line clearance from Roberto Firmino’s header. The spatial awareness, concentration and controlled aggression required to neutralise that lethal Liverpool front line. It vindicated Sarri’s decision to restore a player Antonio Conte had not picked once beyond last February.
Some managers have struggled to understand whether Luiz is a defender or midfielder. The latter, Benitez always thought. But what we witness in Sarri is a 59-year-old manager secure enough in himself to enjoy having such an expressive character in the ranks. Sarri said on Saturday that Luiz was ‘much better than I thought: much better, as a player and a man’ and made it clear that the 31-year-old’s candour was a part of it.
‘I appreciate very much the man as he is direct. If he has to say something to me, he does that. I like direct people. I like very much.
Luiz, Sarri said, ‘was a little confused as two seasons ago he was a protagonist but then came six months without playing. So he was a little confused. I think he is very able to play my way. He is very technical and understands the action of the defensive line very much.’
The good news for the rest of the Premier League is that Luiz will give you a chance. He can be hustled into errors in possession when pressed. Mercifully for Chelsea, a bad moment of carelessness on the ball nine minutes in on Saturday created a chance for a man with a scrambled mind of his own. Mohamed Salah missed.
The same looseness was visible in Luiz when Chelsea were beating Bournemouth last month. Chelsea’s back door is no longer always padlocked as Mourinho liked. Sarri has let in some welcome daylight. ‘He wants us to take pleasure in football,’ Luiz said of Sarri.
‘He says this to us every day.’