Chelsea beat Fulham fairly comfortably at the weekend, but one player who didn’t impress some viewers was David Luiz.
There were complaints, on Chelsea Fan TV for example, that the Brazilian’s defensive showing wasn’t up to scratch, and there were certainly some hairy moments.
Ultimately though the centre-backs kept the dangerous Aleksandr Mitrovic fairly well shackled, and that was all they needed to do to keep a clean sheet.
Luiz played 22 long balls in the game, far more than anyone else. That’s about four and a half times more than the next outfield player, Jorginho, with 5. 15 of them were accurate.
He also played 2 through balls – only Eden Hazard managed to pull one of those off from the entire rest of the Blues lineup.
He’s clearly being asked to play as the playmaker from deep, and whether you like it or not, he’s doing Sarri’s bidding pretty effectively. Is that enough to make up for his defensive lapses?
