Sarri taking the leash off Blues stars
MAURIZIO SARRI’S walks with his dog during the international break will be relaxing ones after his perfect start as Chelsea manager.
Over the next fortnight, Sarri is looking forward to some quality time with his canine friend Ciro, who has now joined him in England.
It will be enjoyable and well earned thanks to a job well done that has put Chelsea among the early leaders.
Sarri’s Blues side have begun the season with four wins from their opening four Premier League games, making him just the sixth new manager to achieve that feat.
They have rediscovered that knack champions and the best Chelsea sides of recent times have possessed of finding a route to victory, no matter how they get there.
He has retained his best player – Eden Hazard – and one of the most important pieces of his Sarri-ball puzzle looks to be in place already.
A devastating counter-attacking outfit at their best under former manager Antonio Conte, Chelsea have wasted little time getting to grips with Sarri’s demand to dominate possession.
For the fourth game running, the Blues have hogged the ball – 63 per cent against Huddersfield, 62 against Arsenal, 81 against Newcastle and now 73 per cent against Bournemouth.
Once again, they had to wait patiently for all that possession, pushing and probing to pay off against the Cherries.
Ultimately, though, it did and for the third successive game they won late on thanks to goals in the last 20 minutes from substitute Pedro and Hazard. However, the Belgian had a warning for his team-mates, saying: “We just need to play quicker.
“The manager doesn’t like it when we just keep the ball at the back. He wants the ball moving forward. We are trying to do this in training and also when we have a game.”
Bournemouth manager Eddie Howe, meanwhile, was impressed by what he saw during his first Premier League look at summer signings Jefferson Lerma and Diego Rico.
Club-record signing, £25million midfielder Lerma and left-back Rico, a £10.7m capture, both made their league bows against Chelsea.
And Howe said: “Lerma did really well. I was very pleased. You saw real qualities he is going to bring to the team. He was blocking shots, defensively he was very good and very mobile in the middle of midfield.
“He and Dan Gosling had a lot of work to get through and they did it really well from a defensive perspective.
“Diego did well. Usually you’d see him a lot more attacking than you did today as he is more of a full-back in the mould of Charlie Daniels or Adam Smith.
“But he had to be more reserved and had a lot of defending to do.”