The Oil Firm Derby

A rampant Manchester City side visiting an embattled Stamford Bridge, where players and some members of the media have been exiled by a young manager under pressure. Chelsea, who had already lost two of their last three home games, and had lost games against United and QPR as well, were billed as vast underdogs as they awaited the visit of Roberto Mancini's men.

And after the fiery Mario Balotelli opened the scoring after two minutes, you could be forgiven if you were already penning the eulogies for a certain AVB.

Last week, I wrote about how Chelsea had abandoned their high line and how it proved to be an effective tweak in AVB's highly-favoured "Porto 4-3-3". Against Newcastle, they were defensively sound and kept a clean sheet. Their abandonment of the high line against Valencia also proved beneficial, but for some inexplicable reason, the London club decided to opt for this tactic yet again against City.

I've already touched upon why the high defensive line isn't suited for Chelsea and their squad (last week), and against City - especially with the livewire Sergio Aguero - it seemed an almost comical decision. And it was Aguero who found is strike partner early on, and Balotelli almost turned provider for the Son-in-Law-of-God a few minutes later, as the plodding Chelsea backline kept with AVB's protocol.

An argument for his case might be that AVB opted to put pressure on the City midfield, and David Silva in particular, as Liverpool did so well in their 1-1 draw recently. There, a fired-up Lucas Leiva took David Silva out of the game completely, making him a non-factor with a quite brilliant display of man-marking in midfield. The difference here, though, is that no man-marking role seemed to have been assigned to anyone among the Chelsea trio of Raul Meireles, Oriol Romeu and Ramires. David Silva was then free to drift to either flank, as City lined up with their own trio of James Milner, Gareth Barry an Yaya Toure behind the Spaniard.

La Masia graduate Romeu again played the role of deep-anchorman, almost always sitting alongside Terry and Ivanovic while Cole and Bosingwa moved forward, turning the 4-3-3 into a 3-4-3. Again, this is something we've seen all season with Chelsea, with varying degrees of success. Romeu and Meireles (when deployed there), have been much more influential and effective than a certain Jon Obi Mikel, culpable for Liverpool's first goal in their own clash last month.

Early on, City's 4-3-1-2 formation (the one Mancini preferred at Inter, and also something I praised highly very early in the season) seemed to dominate AVB's 4-3-3/3-4-3. With an unmarked David Silva finding gaps to play despite the high line, Sergio Aguero and Mario Balotelli exploited the space behind the Chelsea defense, who struggled to cope with the attacking trio early on.

Again, it is strange to see AVB revert back to his instruction of a high defensive line after success without it, and especially against a side who have the pre-eminent midfield Trequartista in the league (if not the world) and two skilful and mobile strikers. Roberto Mancini may have had that high line in mind when selecting his lineup, picking Balotelli ahead of the less mobile Dzeko, or Samir Nasri, who would have gotten in the way of David Silva in midfield, if anything. This is the same Mario Balotelli who, only a few weeks ago, that Roberto Mancini said he would not pick in the big games due to his temperament.

With all the focus on Man City's attacking prowess though, the goal they conceded was sloppy, if you're being kind. Former City man Daniel Sturridge breezed past Clichy to whip in a ball towards Meireles to volley home. This, during a passage of the game where City had visibly slackened. A cynic might suggest that should Nigel De Jong have started, he might have helped City maintain their lead with his no-nonsense, hard-man approach. But De Jong started on the bench, only coming on for Silva after they were reduced to 10 men and hanging on, during a period where Chelsea were enjoying up to 80% possession even against 11 men. The tactical analysis, of course, flew out the window after Clichy's dismissal (not a good day for him...), and Chelsea piled on the pressure and eventually found the winner.

On a side note, one wonders why City paid so much money for Gael Clichy, who is arguably far inferior to Jose Enrique at Liverpool.

This isn't the first time that City have let a lead slip due to a drop in work ethic (Fulham early on) and with the red card, penalty, and overall performance in the second half one wonders if the City collapse that so many have predicted (or hoped for...?) has finally come. Chelsea, too, have questions and issues to face themselves; persisting with the high-line, shaky defensive pairing, the futures of Malouda, Alex, and even Drogba and Lampard and probably Mikel.

Overall, Manchester United and their supporters will be delighted with Chelsea's victory, their joy second only to Chelsea themselves who have both qualified from a tricky Champions League group and have handed the league leaders their first domestic loss since the Community Shield. A bad week for Roberto Mancini, who saw his own side knocked out of Europe's premier competition, of course (while an even less experienced Napoli side went through). After a weekend where all eyes were on El Classico early Sunday morning, the Premier League title race may have just been reignited by the result at "El Cashico".

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Chelsea's Line-Dancing

Ever since Roman Abramovich took control of Stamford Bridge in 2003, the revolving door at Chelsea has been ever-turning, with players and managers alike moving in and out of London with perhaps an alarming frequency. I've written about their latest boss before, and while I've been a fan of the man and his principles, the pressure has been growing on the young manager, who only recently claimed that his employers can't afford to sack him.

Promising a more adventurous and entertaining approach to football, Andre Villas-Boas has certainly done well to dispel the pragmatic Chelsea style that counterpart and former mentor Jose Mourinho instilled into the side. Unfortunately for AVB though, one of the key components of Mourinho's all-conquering side was their defensive solidarity, and that seems to have evaporated quite suddenly. In 2004-05, the season Mourinho first won the title at Chelsea, their side conceded just 15 goals all season, compared to the 17 the current Chelsea team has already shipped in.

In many games this season, Chelsea have deployed a "high defensive line", a tactic employed by many, including the current Barcelona side. This tactical ploy affords opposition forwards space behind the defence, but also increases the likelihood of them being caught offside, and squeezes the play in midfield, pressuring the middle of the park. Unfortunately for AVB though, the gambit cost them more than it helped. Off the top of my head, the Blues allowed clear cut chances against West Brom, Norwich, Man Utd and Arsenal due to catastrophic failures of their high line.

Against Newcastle though, the Chelsea high line was almost non-existent, and AVB's side came away with a very good three points, and a clean sheet at St. Jam - oh, I mean the Sports Direct Arena. The defensive performance, of course, was helped by an immense display from John Terry, including clearing an effort off the line to preserve his side's lead. Far cry from the black mark he has been receiving recently from many corners (including me) especially after his slip-up against Arsenal.

But Terry's stalwart display was indeed helped in no small part by the abandonment of the high line. Looking at the areas in which he made and won interceptions, tackles and headers, you can see that Chelsea played much, much, deeper at Tyneside.

One of the important factors that determine the success of a high defensive line is the presence of pacy defenders. This is due to the fact that they need to be able to compensate for the inevitable failure of the offside trap, and get back to make amends for any errors on the part of their fellow defenders or officials. We can all agree that even a youthful John Terry never was never a sprinter, and so playing a much deeper line suited him and Chelsea as a team.

The discipline of the entire back-line is also important for the deployment of a high-line, and while Mourinho's side (who didn't play high) had Ricardo Carvalho beside a John Terry on top of his game, AVB has to work with Branislav Ivanovic or David Luiz, both of which are prone to bookings and have been shown to be vulnerable to pace as well. The fact that wingbacks Cole and Bosingwa aren't the best defensively doesn't help matters. Playing the Serbian at right-back alleviates that wing-back problem, but then you have him as well as Luiz alongside Terry, since AVB seems not to fancy Alex. Tactical discipline is another matter, with the great Milan side of Arrigo Sacchi marshalled by legendary Franco Baresi, master of the offside trap and flanked by Alessandro Costacurta and a prodigal Paolo Maldini. The defensive gaps that Chelsea have allowed (in addition to the failed offside traps) against Liverpool and Arsenal in particular, as well as David Luiz's tendency to bomb forward, suggest that this tactical discipline is another issue.

Finally, perhaps a very important difference between Jose Mourinho's selfish Chelsea and AVB's charitable one is the presence (or absence) of one midfielder specifically. While many have called out Arsenal for not replacing Patrick Vieira, Chelsea have similarly not replaced Claude Makelele. Both Frenchmen were the anchormen in the midfield of their London sides, adding much-needed strength, grit and stability to the back-line by acting as a buffer or shield in front of the back four. Other notable anchormen include Mascherano at Liverpool, Gattuso at Milan, and Tiote at Newcastle, who was missed against Chelsea of course.

One of the aspects of his AVB's imported "Porto 4-3-3" (as I like to call it) is the role that the holding midfielder plays. AVB has rotated between Jon Obi Mikel, Raul Meireles and most recently Oriol Romeu as that holding midfielder, who does still serve to protect the back-line, but is also supposed to act like a third ball-playing defender while the wingbacks attack. Indeed, the attacking contribution of Cole, Bosingwa and Ivanovic (when played there) have been very important to Chelsea this season, but it is currently imbalanced from a defensive standpoint.

This tactical nuance is most keenly seen at Barcelona, where Sergio Busquets (and sometimes Keita) plays as that "third defender", who is still able to play clever passes from the back to add to the attack. It is this passing ability (or lack thereof) that has seen Javier Mascherano move from defensive midfielder to central defender (a limited defender, some will call it) in the Catalan side. Mikel is not that sort of clever player. Meireles has a great range of passing, but his talent is wasted playing too deep (like Wayne Rooney). It is no surprise then, that it looks like the best person suited for the job (as seen in the past two weeks) is a graduate of the La Masia academy. Romeu isn't a long-term solution though, as Barcelona already have very clever clauses to buy him back at a cut-price if he does succeed at Chelsea (which he is expected to), like Bojan Krkic at AS Roma.

So it does look like AVB has abandoned the high-line that has been so risky for the London side, at least for now. Additionally, he has put faith in the young Romeu (and Daniel Sturridge) for now to help integrate his vision of how a 4-3-3 and how football should be played. It will be interesting to see if Chelsea continue this trend, and either way, how the futures of AVB, John Terry and Chelsea pan out in the months to come.

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