The season is over and we can look back at the facts and the figures from a horror campaign with relatively objectivity now the dust has settled.
We’re always interested in the games in which Chelsea did particularly well or badly on xG, and this case it’s a classic.
The Blues’ highest xG of the season (2.7) in the Premier League came against Everton on the 18th March, and typically they didn’t even win the game. The Blues went 2-1 up in the 76th minute thanks to a Kai Havertz penalty, and then conceded in the 89th minute.
Graham Potter held onto his job for one more game – a loss to Aston Villa – and was then sacked.
If his Blues team had put away more of their chances in that match, things could have been so different. The chances we did have summed up a lot of our season – a Mateo Kovacic shot lashed wide, a Kai Havertz header point blank over the bar, Joao Felix not able to get a stud on the ball ahead of Jordan Pickford, Havertz header right at the keeper.
The nail in the coffin in this case wasn’t our chance creation or even our scoring though – we had managed 2 and only had to hold out for a few minutes more. But the infamous moment where Kalidou Koulibaly sold himself to try and stop Ellis Simms cost us – and ultimately cost Potter his job.
Defeat to Aston Villa cost Potter his job having won 4 and drawn against Everton he was still in charge for Villa. Ignoring the fact of the worst injury list I have seen and 6 weeks prior and during Qatar when he had 5 players only not to mention throwing 6 players into the mix in January Boehly and Co bottled it due fan unrest. So much for a long term project.