London is Blue Dispatch #055

In the end, it was a game of two halves, both requiring much work (understandably) before Man City bring the heat. A 2-2 draw against a League One side is perhaps not the feel-good result Enzo Maresca would have wanted in his first game in charge, but it was a fair result in hindsight.

The first half XI offered optimistic glimpses of a process still in its infancy. Maresca and his staff seemed to have profiled the players well. Marc Guiu, arguably the brightest performer on the day, ran the line by himself, doing things he is best at – pressing, chasing and pestering the last line, a Vardy-esque role instead of a Daka one where dropping deep, receiving and turning were prioritized. Noni and Tyrique as 1v1 wingers, Tosin, Badiashile, Colwill against a very physical Wrexham front 2 felt like well thought-out moves.

Elsewhere, there were cobwebs slowly being aired out. Lavia, bizarrely starting his first Chelsea game a year after signing, looked quite comfortable in a deeper role next to Reece James, who was playing in a midfield role exactly 2000 days after he first started in senior football as a midfielder against QPR for Wigan. There were some moments of hesitation & unease in defensive transition, but the pair fared pretty well otherwise.

Nkunku and Carney at 8s were sanguine at best for the 45, perhaps not risking exertions this early in preseason with underlaps and quick darts into space. Tyrique and Noni were then forced to dribble at a relatively comfortable line of 5 for Wrexham, which isn’t always easy to do. Less than 72 hours after landing in the States, honing match sharpness and escaping unscathed felt like bigger priorities than anything else. 74% of the ball and a lead to protect will be a scenario that makes Maresca very happy once the season starts.

The 2^nd half was a clunky, shaky mess, with individual decisions and errors galore. Lesley Ugochukwu, enduring a hard few weeks personally after only making the reserves for the French Olympic squad, made two errors in quick succession to gift Wrexham an equalizer. A few minutes before Wrexham took the lead, Gusto and Santos curiously switched positions in the pivot. The ball was lost on the right, with Andrey eased off the ball. Acheampong, one of 3 fullbacks in the back 4 stepped up but didn’t get close enough to proceedings. It took Ugochukwu making amends after a poor display to help restore dignity to the scoreline.

At such an early point, speculation on permanent tactical features or fixating on individual displays and the result are an exercise in futility. The highs are far more important to focus on – Fofana’s 45 minutes equaled the half he played in his last appearance for Chelsea 424 days ago, Lavia and Chukwuemeka both notched their highest ever minutes in a game in a Chelsea shirt (Lavia with his first 45 and Carney with his first 90.) That’s just how difficult it has been, injury-wise, over the past three years. The handbrakes should come off a couple of games into preseason, and with the likes of Caicedo, Enzo, Jackson, Mudryk, Cucurella and Palmer still to feature, the best is, perhaps, yet to come.