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Tom Hamilton, Senior Writer
LONDON — This fourth-round FA Cup tie at Stamford Bridge on Friday was a match of missed chances. Both Chelsea and Aston Villa managed to get themselves into positions where it looked inevitable there’d be a match-changing chance, but time and time again, there was no end product. For all the attacking ambition, as the match continued to ebb and flow, the 0-0 draw seemed inevitable.
The match was entertaining, with Villa having a first-half goal disallowed due to a handball. Cole Palmer and Noni Madueke had the best chances of the match for Chelsea, but on each occasion it was goalkeeper Emiliano Martinez who thwarted them. And despite all the joy in the first half Chelsea found down Villa’s wings, they just couldn’t turn that into goals.
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Villa were well-organised and packed the midfield as they do under manager Unai Emery, but will lament their own missed opportunities. Youri Tielemans had two superb chances in the first half to open the scoring, while Matty Cash saw a brilliant effort well-saved by goalkeeper Djordje Petrovic. But for all the profligacy, it’ll be Chelsea who will be concerned the most by this deadlock.
No end product. We’ve heard this before about Chelsea this season as the inescapable question of how for all the money spent under owner Todd Boehly, they’ve overlooked a proven goal scorer. They started this match against Villa with the incredibly impressive Palmer as a false 9. He must be so tricky to play against — against Villa he was constantly standing 10 yards or so behind the Villa defence in an offside position, waiting for the wingers to chomp up open space in front of them to bring Palmer onside.
It worked. In the first half, Villa struggled to find the balance between shutting down Raheem Sterling and Madueke while keeping tabs on where Palmer was. Chelsea should have taken full advantage.
Sterling had a brilliant first half on the left, twisting and turning Cash inside out. It was down the wings where Chelsea had much of their joy, their best chances coming in the first 45. Chelsea had three brilliant chances in the first half to open the scoring. Palmer’s link play and some brilliant Sterling play put Madueke in space on the right of Chelsea’s attack, but his placed effort was well-saved by Martinez.
Then it was Palmer’s chance, one-on-one, as he snaffled up a poor back pass from Clément Lenglet after 18 minutes but his effort was again saved by the Villa goalkeeper. Madueke had a point-blank-range shot saved by Martinez after Palmer and Sterling combined to flash the ball across the box, but for all the attacking endeavour, there wasn’t any breakthrough.
In return, Villa too had their opportunities. They managed to get the ball into the Chelsea net after 11 minutes after Moussa Diaby‘s well-struck effort deflected off young Alfie Gilchrist — a late replacement for Levi Colwill — into Luiz’s path. The ricochet left Luiz with an empty net and he tapped home, but the goal was disallowed for a handball of the Gilchrist deflection. Tielemans then had Villa’s best two other chances of the half as he had an unmarked header saved by Petrovic and flashed a first-time effort over the bar. Plenty of effort and opportunity but no cutting edge.
The second half was a little tighter, with Villa and Chelsea pressing and prodding in midfield with clear-cut chances at a premium. Some of Villa’s defence was slapdash and it was Palmer who had the best chance for Chelsea. A poor Martinez clearance found Palmer around the penalty spot in the 68th minute, but he failed to connect with the looping ball and Martinez could gratefully scoop it up. Conor Gallagher had another sniff of an opportunity as he chased down an under-hit Boubacar Kamara back pass, but again it came to nothing.
Which all begs the question, for all these attacking opportunities, where’s Chelsea’s end product?
Out of both teams, this is a bigger concern for Chelsea. Both teams came into this in impressive form with Chelsea winning five of their last six matches while Villa are sitting pretty in fourth in the Premier League with the fourth most goals. This was a well-organised performance from Villa and they’ll fancy their chances in the replay, even if they have just scored one goal in their last three matches.
But for Chelsea, the debate over their absent first-choice striker has been omnipresent since the Boehly revolution began. They could yet find the answer within. It’s a young squad with plenty of potential there but some of their big-money moves are still finding their feet. Mykhailo Mudryk is still seeking consistency while perhaps the answer to their struggles in front of goal could yet be the incredibly talented Christopher Nkunku, but he is having an awful run of luck with injuries.
Armando Broja — a player who Pochettino says reminds him of a young Harry Kane — started this FA Cup clash on the bench with rumours continuing to swirl over his long-term future. And then there’s Nicolas Jackson, who is on Africa Cup of Nations duty. He’s made an inconsistent start to life at Chelsea.
So in the meantime, amid the absentees, the answer is Palmer. Expect this to change in the summer. As Pochettino has distanced the club from making any move in this transfer window, they’d have surely had half an eye on what was going on in Napoli over the last couple of days with their president admitting Victor Osimhen is likely to leave at the end of the season. That’s for the summer so for the time being, it’ll be a case of juggling what they’ve got to try and find a frequent threat through to the end of the season.
In Pochettino’s programme notes, off the back of their 6-1 win over Middlesbrough earlier this week, he wrote: “We believe in the work we are doing, the players have kept their focus during tough moments and with these six goals on Tuesday, I think we answered a lot of questions.”
But after these goalless draws, there are still questions over this Chelsea team. They played well, the midfield outstanding, Sterling superb, but they are still looking for that cutting edge.