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Chelsea have announced the appointment of Enzo Maresca as their new head coach.
He has signed a five-year contract at Stamford Bridge plus the option of a sixth.
He will bring six members of his coaching staff with him, including former Chelsea goalkeeper Willy Caballero, who was Maresca’s assistant at Leicester City. Danny Walker, Michele De Bernardin, Marcos Alvarez, Javier Molina Caballero and Roberto Vitiello will also move to Stamford Bridge from Leicester with Maresca.
An agreement between Chelsea and Leicester was also signed on Sunday, settling on compensation in the region of £10million.
Chelsea are said to be sensitive to the disruption caused to Leicester ahead of their return to the Premier League and appreciative of the professionalism they displayed throughout.
Maresca, 44, was appointed at Leicester last summer and guided them to the Championship title and automatic promotion to the Premier League.
The former Manchester City assistant spent time on the coaching staff of Sevilla and West Ham United, before a short spell as Parma head coach in Italy’s second tier at the start of the 2021-22 season, where he sacked after only six wins in 14 games.
During a long playing career, Maresca played for clubs including West Bromwich Albion, Juventus, Fiorentina and Sevilla, before retiring in 2017.
Maresca becomes the sixth manager since the Todd Boehly and Clearlake Capital-led takeover of the club in 2022.
Thomas Tuchel was sacked in September 2022, with his replacement Graham Potter also dismissed less than seven months later in April 2023. Bruno Saltor and then Frank Lampard both took charge of Chelsea on an interim basis, before Mauricio Pochettino was appointed ahead of the 2023-24 season.
Chelsea and Pochettino mutually agreed to part ways last week after the club finished sixth in the Premier League and secured a place in next season’s Europa Conference League.
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What Chelsea fans can expect from Maresca
Analysis from Leicester City correspondent Rob Tanner
There will obviously be doubts and questions asked about Maresca by Chelsea fans. What can’t be questioned is how committed Maresca is to the job at hand and how hungry he is to succeed. Maresca is nothing if not meticulous. He could even be described as a workaholic.
After going from Pep Guardiola’s assistant at the English and European champions to stepping down to the Championship, Maresca did his homework. In fact, he watched every single game of Leicester’s relegation season — sometimes more than once — so he could see for himself what he was working with. His preparation for every game also consisted of hours of footage of the opposition, studying their approach.
Maresca is friendly and jovial with his squad and has an open-door policy for players needing to share issues, on and off the pitch. But none of them have been left in any doubt about what he expects.
“What I don’t like and I don’t negotiate over is bad behaviour or lack of respect towards me, my staff or team-mates,” he told The Athletic. “But I like to be open. I like to speak with the players about general things. Anything they need. No problem.”
Maresca might not be the manager with a big reputation and long distinguished record that some Chelsea fans want, but he knows who he is and how he wants to go about things. It might feel like a step into the unknown, but Chelsea fans can know exactly what they would get from Maresca and his team.
After all the recent failures of big-name managers at Chelsea, it might be time for something different.
Maresca guided Leicester to the Championship title (Nick Potts/PA Images via Getty Images)
How Maresca likes his teams to play
Analysis by Mark Carey
Maresca oversaw a stylistic change as Leicester City have returned to the Premier League at the first time of asking as Championship title winners.
The Italian is staunchly dedicated to his coaching principles based on positional play, and it is hardly surprising that his style closely resembles that of Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City — given his time as Guardiola’s first-team assistant during the 2022-23 treble-winning season.
Maresca’s 4-3-3 quickly becomes a 3-2-5 in possession as he asks a full-back (typically Ricardo Pereira) to come inside to form a double pivot alongside former England midfielder Harry Winks — allowing his No 8s to push high alongside the wingers and central striker.
Similarly focused on building out from the back, Maresca encourages goalkeeper Mads Hermansen to join the defensive line to create overloads and disrupt the opposition press. No Championship goalkeeper had a lower “launch rate” — defined as passes longer than 40 yards — than Hermansen this season, which highlights Maresca’s desire to be patient in possession.
Much like a Guardiola side, Maresca is keen for his team to exert territorial dominance and quickly retrieve possession when they lose it. As evidence of this, Leicester boasted the second-highest field tilt (62 per cent) and most possessions won in the attacking third (five per 90) of any side in the second tier this season.
While some may point to a style that can be overly dogmatic at times, Maresca has been quick to highlight the flexibility his side have shown since he arrived at a newly relegated Leicester last summer.
“The players have really surprised me in terms of how they adapt and how they can change the structure during the game,” Maresca said. “I think there have been many games this season where we started in one way and finished in another way.”
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(Malcolm Couzens/Getty Images)
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Courtesy : https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/5522388/2024/06/03/enzo-maresca-chelsea-head-coach/