What a difference nine months makes. Rewind back to July 2025 and Chelsea were being crowned champions of the world, having beaten Champions League winners PSG with a dominant display that offered plenty of promise for the future.
While the merits of that trophy can be debated, the manner of the win was encouraging for the fans, players and the club hierarchy, justifying the entry into the Club World Cup, while showing that the Blues can go toe-to-toe with the best sides in the world.
Questions remained, but Enzo Maresca and his players had done their part at the end of a season that had seen triumph in the Conference League and a top-four finish. It wasn’t spectacular, but it was something to build on.
Fast forward eight months and the world champions faced their European counterparts once more, this time in a two-legged tie in the Champions League. Chelsea competed well for the best part of 74 minutes, but a late collapse took the tie away from them before they were blown away in the home leg to fall to an 8-2 aggregate loss.
Just over a month later and the Blues’ hopes of qualifying for next season’s Champions League now look slim, with the 1-0 loss to Manchester United meaning they sit 10 points behind the Red Devils. They could also go seven points behind fifth-placed Liverpool if Arne Slot’s side win the Merseyside derby.
Chelsea boss Liam Rosenior said that the result against Man Utd leaves his side with “a mountain to climb”, and though he insisted that “it’s not insurmountable”, it now feels like the Blues are once again teetering on the edge of a crisis.
And while Rosenior will face plenty of criticism for a string of poor performances that have yielded four losses in a row without scoring in the league for the first time since 1998, it is too easy to direct anger at a manager who is becoming a scapegoat for problems far beyond his control.
Rosenior remains the face of Chelsea for the media and fans, and it is unavoidable that he’ll face anger and criticism from sections of the fanbase, though in reality, few of the problems at the club are his doing, and nor can he remedy them yet.
The forced sale to the new BlueCo ownership promised plenty, and though headlines of excessive transfer spending were enough to quell initial fears and provide fans some excitement, that hit of dopamine has long subsided, instead leaving the reality of an inexperienced hierarchy managing an equally inexperienced squad that lacks depth in key areas.
The manner of the departure of Enzo Maresca on New Year’s Day added fuel to the fire, and though anger was rightly directed at the hierarchy at first, that same anger has now turned on the only public-facing figure at the club in Rosenior.
Co-owner Behdad Eghbali did recently address fan concerns, finally speaking in public and suggesting a change in transfer policy to “to add more ready-made players” rather than focusing on signing younger, less experienced players. Even then, his words seem empty, dressed up in PR speak and offering little substance.
“The view is to keep, sign and retain and compensate and extend some of the world's best players, and ultimately the view was you need, eight, 10, 12, 15 elite players to win and win sustainably, year after year,” he said. Well, how many do you need? Eight, or 15? And does he understand how difficult it is to build a squad with 15 elite players?
The early suggestions are that the answer to that question is no. While the ownership long seemed more content to tie players to long contracts to preserve and hopefully increase their value, it has left the Blues with a squad that great potential, but few reliable superstars in the starting XI as well as depth on the bench.
That Club World Cup win was followed by a string of questionable signings this summer, and even though the likes of Jamie Gittens clearly possess talent, there’s a feeling that Stamford Bridge is not currently a place where players can grow into that talent.
The build-up to Man Utd game was marked by the club’s Supporters’ Trust (CST) releasing an open letter declaring a “lack of confidence” in the club’s owners, while there were protests from fans of both Chelsea and Strasbourg – who also fall under the BlueCo ownership umbrella – with chants of “We want our Chelsea back” heard outside Stamford Bridge as a group of over 500 fans turned up.
The same chants could be heard late on in the loss to United, while shouts of “You’re not wanted here” were also directed at co‑owner Behdad Eghbali. Todd Boehly got away scot-free, though he remains just as controversial.
It shows that many Chelsea fans are aware of the greater issue at hand. They are presumably not confident that the club hierarchy can (or will) identify and invest in the calibre of player needed to complement the main names, and they might lose the ability to do so this summer if they don’t finish in the top five.
Rosenior deflected questions on how failure to qualify might affect who the club can sign, though Cole Palmer rightly said that not being in the competition “changes everything”.
If the manager is given time, it makes this summer all the more crucial, though signings are tied to the club’s ability to qualify for the Champions League. It means Rosenior’s Chelsea stint could be doomed either way, with a failure to qualify for Europe’s top club competition compounded by an inability to make signings, with a weaker squad then costing him his job down the line.
However, there has been enough encouragement in some performances – notably in the first leg against PSG before their late collapse – to suggest that the new manager is capable of success with his young side if given time. Even Saturday’s loss provided an impressive dominance in many parts, even if the visitors were able to snatch a smash-and-grab win that Rosenior rightly claimed “should be pretty much impossible”.
While results have been poor in recent weeks, Rosenior still deserves time as he tries to fix a problem of someone else’s doing. But whether he will get it remains to be seen, as the hierarchy may decide to part ways with the Englishman to save face and divert attention away from their own mistakes.
