When Chelsea beat Southampton in December 2024 at St. Petersburg. Mary's, a fan of the team, shouted, "We are back to ourselves." At that time, there was a time when The Blues threatened Liverpool's top spot. However, Enzo Maresca's side have now lost three of their last five Premier League games and are stuck in 7th place after round 26.
From being a team full of enthusiasm with young stars, Chelsea is now strangely weak. American bosses began to be criticized and True Blues remembered Roman Abramovich. On the field, the team did not have any leaders. Cole Palmer, the most anticipated player, is no longer in the spotlight.
If Chelsea lose their Champions League ticket this season, it will be the second consecutive time they have been absent from this playground since the new owners invested with billions of pounds. As for Cole Palmer, his talent deserves to be shown in the Champions League. However, the 22-year-old striker may continue to miss the deadline.
Palmer's attitude has been a hot topic of discussion in the last two defeats to Brighton and Aston Villa in the Premier League. The English star is famous for his cold celebration but it seems he is too cold. In the loss to Brighton, Palmer was urged by his teammates to thank the fans in the stands. In the loss to Villa, when the final whistle blew, people only saw Palmer shrunk and shook his head in frustration.
Looking at the big picture, Chelsea have only won 2/10 of their most recent matches. The Blues will face two of their two red-light sides in the Premier League, Southampton and Leicester. In between is the match against Copenhagen in the Conference League. If they win all 4 of these matches, Chelsea will regain their confidence to aim for the important match against Arsenal. In that run, they need Palmer to shine again to lead the fading attack.
Palmer has failed to score in his last 6 matches. One of the reasons for this is that Enzo Maresca is forcing him to do too many things. In the loss to Villa, Palmer missed two good chances but throughout the match, he had to do many things, even serving the entire midfield. Palmer's goals are declining and he is no longer considered a dangerous attacker for Chelsea.
Is blaming Palmer alone for not scoring too one-sided? Despite failing to score in the last 6 matches, Palmer is creating many opportunities. In the past 12 matches, Palmer has an expected assist increase from 2.63 to 4.15. Before the match against Brighton, since December 4, 2024, Palmer had created 32 good chances, the most in the top 5 European championships.
Although Palmer's failure to score is correct, we should also look back to see that Chelsea's attack is currently too harmless.
Thus, Nicolas Jackson's injuries have seriously weakened the Blues. Meanwhile, Christopher Nkunku has shown no signs of being attracted to Chelsea anymore. Along with that, Jadon Sancho, Pedro Neto and Noni Madueke all have problems with their form, causing Chelsea's wings to no longer maintain the storm like at the beginning of the season.
"The most obvious problem right now is that we rely on Cole Palmer for too many problems. Meanwhile, my wish is to rely on the strength of the whole team" - Enzo Maresca shared.
Palmer needs a boost to save himself and salvage his hopes of reaching the Champions League. Otherwise, this could be his last season wearing the London blue shirt.
