Chelsea relieve Liam Rosenior of his duties after just three months in-charge: Are the Blues starting to lose their identity?

Liam Rosenior becomes the sixth manager to get sacked by the Blue Co. ownership at Chelsea since 2022. (Image credits – CommonsWikipedia, Licence Details)

Chelsea have sacked manager Liam Rosenior after just three months in charge of the club after a poor run of results which saw them lose five games in a row, conceding 11 goals and scoring none.

Rosenior had signed a five-and-a-half-year contract with the Blues after arriving from Strasbourg, which is also owned by the BlueCo group led by Todd Boehly and co. The 41-year-old managed just 11 wins out of 23 games across all competitions while enduring the club's worst scoreless streak since 1912.

Chelsea fans protested against the ownership and chanted against the team when they travelled to Brighton last game to watch their team get hammered 3-0. Rosenior was furious with the performance and described it as “indefensible” and “unacceptable” as per the club's high standards.

This defeat has left the Blues stranded at eighth position, just three points above 12th-placed Fulham. The Blues could fall below 10th if Sunderland, Brentford and Everton win their remaining game in hand, and that would leave Chelsea in a critical condition, as the club was firmly in contention to finish top four this season back in November.

“Liam has always conducted himself with the highest integrity and professionalism following his appointment midway through the season," Chelsea's official statement said. (sic)

It further said, "This has not been a decision the club has taken lightly; however, recent results and performances have fallen below the necessary standards with still so much more to play for this season.” (sic)

"As the club works to bring stability to the head coach position, we will undertake a process of self-reflection to make the right long-term appointment," Chelsea added. (sic)

As per our sources, Bournemouth boss Andoni Iraola, who is set to leave the club this summer, could be an option and is being considered within the club. Former Borussia Dortmund boss Edin Terzic is also appreciated by the top club officials and could be an option as he is currently a free agent. Fulham’s Marco Silva is Chelsea's third choice option to replace Liam Rosenior next summer.

For now, the Blues U-21 boss Callum McFarlane will take over the main team as interim manager until the end of the season. The Englishman was Rosenior’s assistant coach and was in charge of the team which drew 1-1 against Manchester City and lost 2-1 to Fulham earlier this season following the sacking of Enzo Maresca. McFarlane will be in charge when the Blues face Leeds United at Wembley at the FA Cup semi-final.

Why did Liam Rosenior flop at Chelsea despite doing a brilliant job at Strasbourg?

Under Liam Rosenior, Chelsea have lost five successive Premier League games without scoring a single goal for the first time since 1912, the year when the Titanic sank. Only Tottenham have won fewer points than the Blues in the past nine games in the league, and that just shows how bad Chelsea have been following the departure of Enzo Maresca.

Therefore, Liam Rosenior's sack didn't come as a shock; it was a conclusion of a poor appointment from the Chelsea ownership. He is the sixth manager who has been sacked under the BlueCo leadership, and it shows a pattern of the club's inconsistent and flawed sporting project.

One of the biggest reasons for Rosenior to flop at Chelsea was the lack of a clear tactical identity. Unlike Maresca, who had a clear blueprint in his tactics, he got results, won a trophy and even was on course to finish top four this season.

Under Rosenior, Chelsea looked like a team that wanted to play possession-based football only to press slowly and suddenly switch to a pragmatic approach mid-game. The players who were slowly getting accustomed to Maresca’s playing style couldn't adapt to it, and it led to utter chaos on the pitch.

In modern football, teams have to adapt, and every top manager has done so. However, Rosenior's system felt too naive, and the quality of football dropped every passing week. The midfield had no control of the game despite having quality players like Enzo Fernandes and Moises Caicedo, which left the team vulnerable to counterattacks.

Defensively, the Blues were left too open, and there was no coordination between the fullbacks and the centre backs, which repeatedly left the centre backs isolated. The opponents were able to read Rosenior's Chelsea like a book, and they just had to stick to basics and be organised enough to expose them.

Rosenior’s team selection and in-game management were atrocious. Week after week, his starting XI remained inconsistent, and players who were underperforming continued to get chances, and the ones who deserved a chance did not get any minutes. This ruined the squad morale and confidence they had built during Maresca's era.

The 41-year-old couldn't manage the young lads of the club, and he could not handle the egos of the star players. His substitutions or in-game changes when the team went behind used to come too late to even have an impact on the game.

Instead of replacing the underperforming players or adding tactical tweaks in-game to confuse the opposition, he went for like-for-like changes, which made him extremely predictable, and any experienced manager could read his understanding of the game, shifting the game in their favour. While the team struggled on the pitch, behind the scenes players started to get frustrated at the boss, and the players’ body language seemed extremely off during the games.

Rosenior failed to instil any sort of belief or mentality into the players, and the team became psychologically fragile, and this ultimately led to heavy defeats. All this chaos led to poor results, which was inevitable, and this is simply unacceptable when one is managing a big club like Chelsea.

The 41-year-old’s ill-fated appointment is a reminder that having potential isn't always enough to succeed, as ideas without the ability to execute them are simply useless, and this ultimately cost him his position at the club.

For Chelsea the club has been in complete crisis from the moment they decided to sack Enzo Maresca, who was building a successful sporting project. However, his sacking destroyed it all, and now the club is staring at nothing as they might finish below 12th on the table with nothing to fight for apart from the domestic competitions next season.

For Rosenior, he made certain mistakes, and he's quite young for a manager; he must figure out his errors from this spell and develop a clear footballing identity and trust it to ensure that his ideas get reflected on the pitch as well.