Andre Villas-Boas: Grading the New Chelsea Manager

With the transfer window shut and the heart of the season approaching, it is time to take a look at Andre Villas-Boas’ first few months in charge at Chelsea.

With a 2-1-0 record, Chelsea sits comfortably in fourth place with a big match against United looming only three weeks away.

Not many moves were made during the summer by the Portuguese boss, suggesting that he is content with the team he has to see them through the glory.

These grades are an approximation of how the coach has done so far. They are most likely to change for better or worse and are more a benchmark than anything.

I have graded him in eight separate categories and provided a final grade based on my overall feeling.

Here is Villas-Boas’ first report card…

First Impression

When Villas-Boas was first introduced to the Chelsea fans, he was done so through the scope of a Jose Mourinho protege.

Villas-Boas was with Mourinho when the manager was at the club and followed him afterwards. He then broke off on his own and successfully raised two clubs to new levels and brought glory back to Porto in one of their greatest seasons in the club's history.

But for the optimism which the media and heads at the clubs tried to instill in the fans over their choice of putting a 33 year-old in charge of this ailing group of veterans, Villas-Boas showed a refreshing amount of humility that is anything but what his supposed "mentor" did.

He came in and within days presented himself as an established man of the game, declaring publicly that the team would no longer play the static, through-the-middle style that caused them to lose out on a repeat title. He would bring "flair" to the club, and a rejuvenated sense of excitement.

But what he did better than anything in the first few days of his reign was earning the confidence of the club, the players and most importantly the fans.

At only 33 years old, he is only a few months the senior to some of the players. It is difficult enough for veterans to change their style, let alone when it is requested by someone who they could have been in the same class with.

As for fans, many were skeptical of how someone so young could lead their side back to glory. Everyone was aware of the success he had achieved at Porto, but would he be able to replicate it in the Premier League in one of the most stressful coaching jobs in the world?

To both players and fans, his unmitigated bravado in early interviews set the tone for the beginning of his tenure. He seemed well experienced beyond his years and physically calmed nerves with his charming appearance and warm smile.

First impressions don’t always make or break a coach, but it helps when you already start off on the right foot.

Grade: A

Preseason

Chelsea had seven preseason games this summer and won all of them. However, they were not all the finest displays of footballing.

A very early game against Portsmouth saw them win 1-0 on an own goal from former Chelsea defender Tal Ben Haim. Hilario also was forced to stop a penalty in that contest.

They rarely created chances and threatened the goal too few times for playing a far inferior side. It was the first moment when Villas-Boas might have seen how far the team had to go to get ready.

Next, the team ventured to the Far East for a tour of Malaysia, Thailand and Hong Kong to play some of the local squads.

A 1-0 victory over Malaysia XI and a 4-0 victory over Thailand XI were both positive results, but how they came about was far less glamorous.

Another own goal got them by Malaysia, and they more imposed their physical superiority over Thailand than actual footballing skill. Like a man playing a child, they didn’t need to show anything in the way of movement or technique. They just out-muscled them.

The game against Kitchee was the coming-out party of sorts for Villas-Boas' Chelsea. It was the first game in which they were moving the ball, creating their own opportunities and converting with some nicely set-up goals.

The following game against Aston Villa was Villas-Boas' first test in charge.

Though only a friendly preseason match, it never hurts to get one over on your rivals as well as win some silverware. The 2-0 victory was lacking offensively, with both goals being helped by a bit of luck, but defensively solid.

Overall, Villas-Boas’ first preseason at Stamford Bridge was a success. He had a perfect record and allowed only one goal in the seven matches, best of any Premier League side.

But perhaps the best thing he did was really give the youngsters a chance to shine.

Coming in as a new head coach, it almost seemed like he was holding tryouts in the preseason games. Players, whether it be a veteran or a youngster, split playing time nearly equally. This gave the likes of Josh McEachran and Daniel Sturridge a chance to really show what they have to offer and earn regular spots on the senior squad.

It also was important for him to understand what he has and how to build for the future.

However, the Villas-Boas system still seemed foreign to many of the players. They won all their matches, but not in the fashion that the boss drew it up.

Going into the season, it was obvious that they would struggle out of the gate as the rotating of players may have benefitted the future, but also hindered the development of chemistry for now.

The preseason is the time to get your players ready and make sure there are no questions left to be answered heading into the regular season. There were still plenty of questions begging to be answered by the time the season got underway.

Grade: B-

Handling of the Veterans

There is no denying that Chelsea is an older squad. The core of the legends who brought the  silverware to Chelsea almost a decade ago are now in their thirties and are beginning to play like it.

Frank Lampard has lost a step in his game. His vision is not quite as keen as it once was, and his passes not as crisp.

John Terry’s pace has slowed considerably and seems to never be playing at 100 percent fitness.

Ashley Cole played in a remarkable 48 games last season, starting in many. That is far too many for a 30-year-old. It is only a matter of time before he breaks down.

Didier Drogba and Michael Essien are too often injured to be relied on consistently.

The injury crisis that struck Stamford Bridge last season was devastating to the team. It forced players to assume positions they had little or no experience playing, and brought youngsters into the game far before they could be effectively counted on.

Nonetheless, the names mentioned above as well as a few others are the ones that brought greatness to the club and are legendary on the grounds. As long as they are still playing and capable, it is difficult to bench them for transfers or young unproven faces. Not to mention that many of them still have much in the way to contribute to the team

Further complicating the situation is something I mentioned earlier, and that is the rather small age gap between the coach and these players.

When presented with the challenge of how to integrate fresh young talent into a side full of proud veterans, he stated something that surprised many:

"We can find things in players' talent that they thought they didn't have. We think there's something extra we can get out of them, so that is why we focus on ambition and motivation. That is the philosophy we have from top to bottom in all our departments. It is a question of creating empathy, motivation and raising ambitions in everybody."

Unlike past managers who have come into Chelsea, opened Papa Roman’s wallet and revamped the team, Villas-Boas is well aware of the need for continuity in the club.

It does not do anyone any good to bring in a new lot of players, and dump the ones that gave you this opportunity. If he were to do this, not only is he losing talent, but also can risk losing the locker room as the influence those veterans have can turn newcomers against him.

So far he has stuck by his word and kept nearly all of the veterans on the roster, with many of them being the first choice on game day. The ones who have been on the bench have raised no public grievances over it, so it is safe to assume that they accept their role.

It is never easy to come into a new team and earn the respect of the players, but with the odds stacked against him, Villas-Boas has done a commendable job.

Grade: B+

Handling of the Transfer Window

Villas-Boas was signed to a contract as soon as Chelsea knew he was their man.

The reason for this was to give him as much time as possible to venture out into the transfer market. And with Abramovich’s deep pockets now funding his spree, many believed he would follow in the footsteps of the managers before him and spend heavily.

Instead, Villas-Boas waited patiently to assess all his options and needs.

In a mature fashion that even the so-called "Special One" was incapable of, he allowed his players to show him what they had first before he ran out and replaced them. Going into August, he only signed one player, 19-year-old goalie Thibaut Courtois, who was immediately loaned out to Atletico Madrid.

The theme of this transfer window for the boss was to build for the future.

Like the previous slide stated, this is an older squad, but not yet full of has-beens. It is better to recruit young now while the older guys can still carry their load and allow the youngsters to develop with and around them.

Signing Romelu Lukaku, Oriel Romeu and Ulises Davila reflects this attitude. They will be featured very little this season, if at all, but will certainly be called upon in the coming years.

It was only one week before his first real impact signing in Juan Mata. However, it would be one that was looked upon favorably by most and paid immediate dividends. His brilliant technique as well as goal in only 30 minutes of play was instant gratification.

He also was able to keep nearly the entire team intact. With the exception of Yuri Zhirkov, the 25-man roster has nearly all the same names as last year in addition to the newcomers.

But when you bring in players, other must be moved to make room for them.

Miraculously, Villas-Boas was able to send all of them out to other teams on loan. The younger players such as Tomas Kalas, Gael Kakuta and Patrick van Aanholt will benefit much more as they will develop under regular playing time. Veterans like Yossi Benayoun, who is well worthy of starting, will get their shot and hopefully return to Chelsea better players for it.

Raul Meireles was the last name penned for Villas-Boas this summer, but going into Wednesday he was the least talked-about in the Chelsea blogosphere. The name that gets that honor? Luka Modric.

The transfer saga that was Luka Modric-to-Chelsea consumed the football tabloids for the entire summer. Harry Redknapp and Dan Levy were adamant that the Croatian was not for sale, but Chelsea persisted.

Chelsea offer £25 million for him. Spurs say no. Chelsea offer £30 million. Spurs warn them to back off. Modric begins to tell the public that he wants out. Levy meets with Modric. The meeting is stopped early. Chelsea come back with £38 million. Etc., etc., etc.

At one point, Chelsea was rumored to be offering Spurs £40 million with Yossi Benayoun plus Salomon Kalou, a deal that would have soared to Torres prices.

In the end nothing came of it, and Modric will remain at Whie Hart Lane to the relief of some Chelsea fans and the dismay of others. But where was Villas-Boas during all of this? He was at the training ground, working with the players he has getting ready for the season.

This was perhaps the most remarkable handling of a transfer window by the manager from a club of this magnitude with the rumors that were circulating.

The media tried to pick his brain on the subject every chance they got, but he remained vague only ever stating that he respects the player and never that he needs him. To be able to control the rumors and keep yourself and your team focused on what really matters is the most difficult part of the transfer season.

Villas-Boas handled it like a pro.

Grade: A-

Tactics

Villas-Boas enjoyed immense success at Porto, running a very dynamic 4-3-3 attacking formation.

The center-backs play a high line to assist the offense with an outlet in the back, as well as push opposition deeper into their half. They also must be good at supplying balls to the midfield.

The full-backs play more of a role as a wing-back, getting high up the flanks, giving the wings a place to feed the ball to before they make their runs and deliver crosses into the box.

The midfield is a lynchpin between the attack and back line. The ball should not spend too much time here as there is not enough support to really play with it. It also is where hard work and true tackling must be constant so as to not allow quick counters with the full-backs up so high.

The wings acted more as wide strikers, who would run onto balls from the midfield and cut inside with them.

The striker was as pure a center forward as you could get, a fast, quick, athletic player asked to do nothing more than put the ball in the back of the net.

More or less, it is team-oriented and requires individual responsibility and work to be effective. It is also very much reliant on creativity to dissect defenses, which will crowd the midfield and stay close together so as not to get stretched out.

Chelsea have not had too much success running this formation yet. There could be a couple of reasons why this is so.

First, there is the suggestion that perhaps this kind of system will not work in a physical and midfield-oriented league like the Premier League. The Portuguese league is a respectable group, but it does not fare well in comparison to the amount of depth in England.

Many teams play with four very well-rounded midfielders who easily stop the Chelsea attack before it gets to the front three where it can actually threaten.

Second, Chelsea do not have the right kind of players to play this style.

Every player on Chelsea’s starting 11 has international caliber talent, but none of those teams play this way. They were all brought up in schools that emphasize traditional characteristics of midfield buildup and a controlled tempo. The signing of Mata should help answer this possibility.

And third, the system requires creativity through the midfield, which Chelsea have lacked for some time now.

With all that said, it has only been two months that these players, many of which have never played this style in their 25-plus years of play, have had to understand and implement the style. It is hard enough to teach old dogs new tricks, but unreasonable to think they will pick it up overnight.

The question at this point is this: When does he abandon the 4-3-3 if it does not ever pick up?

Villas-Boas tried a 4-4-2 last game against Norwich and it was the best outing Chelsea have had yet under him. He will have to seriously evaluate whether continuing to instill it into his players is the right way to go, or whether he should just develop the youth on it and let the old-timers play the way they have been for years.

Grade: C+

Results

Chelsea have not gotten off to the start they were hoping for this season. While seven points in three games is not the worst result possible, it is by no means something to be proud of.

Their opening match to Stoke was a clash of giants.

The big imposing side that Tony Pulis has built battled with the Chelsea big men throughout the entire match, never getting intimidated. There were opportunities on both sides of the ball, but nothing for either team to really say they deserved the full points. With United and City both winning big the opening weekend, a 0-0 draw is not the way one wants to start.

The following week had Villas-Boas in Stamford Bridge for a match against West Brom. Just four minutes into the game, a mix-up between Bosingwa and Alex gave West Brom a lead inside four minutes.

Twenty minutes later, the visitors should have been two up as again Alex made the mental mistake of holding Shane Long onside, giving him and his striking partner Somen Tchoyi a chance. Luckily for him and his manager, the pass was too far ahead of Tchoyi, who should have been able to tap one in for a nightmare 2-0 start.

Finally Anelka was able to break through and get a lucky deflection to level the score. With only 10 minutes left in the match, Bosingwa caught the West Brom defense sleeping and slipped behind them to deliver a lovely cross to Malouda who tapped it in on the far post. They won 2-1, giving Villas-Boas his first win.

Last Saturday’s game against Norwich was by far their best.

They began to click all over the field and a blistering 30-yard shot from Bosingwa gave them an early lead in the sixth minute. Despite having clear possession throughout and dominating the run of play, Chelsea gave Norwich far too many opportunities and were not able to capitalize on their own.

It would take over 70 minutes before Lampard was able to put away a penalty. Juan Mata would wrap it up in injury time after he pounced on an errant pass from the Norwich defense to make the final 3-1.

What will make fans nervous is not the point total, but how the goals were gotten.

Chelsea got a very favorable schedule handed to them and should have dispatched with each team by multiple goals. They should not be relying on deflections, once-a-season shots and defensive mistakes to score. They should be able to create their own opportunities and have enough quality up front to put them away.

Defensively, their record of two goals against is okay, but it had potential to be much more alarming than that. Too many mental errors on the part of the defense could see that easily be three or four and dropping points. It may be early jitters or perhaps the high line, but something needs to be solved quickly.

With Manchester United only two games away, these kinds of results are not going to suffice.

Villas-Boas must use the game against Sunderland to not only get three points, but do it convincingly, so no one can debate that they deserved it and put United on edge a little before heading up north.

Grade: C+

The Torres/Drogba Dilemma

Carlo Ancelotti had a successful year as the head of Chelsea.

He brought the club their only double in its history and followed up the next season with a great run of form. However, when injuries began to hurt the Italian’s record and the season was beginning to look like a lost cause, someone there thought it could be saved by spending £50 million on the Liverpool striker Fernando Torres.

Most fans hailed this as the answer to all of Chelsea’s problems, and that they would be finishing the season champions of England and Europe. Instead it created one of the most enigmatic situations any coach has ever experienced and was the ultimate downfall of his reign at Stamford Bridge.

The riddle is, how do you play a £50 million man whom everyone knows is capable of paying that off in performance at the same time as one of the most prolific and dominating forces to ever play the game in Didier Drogba?

The obvious solution is to play them together, but the two could never quite connect for whatever reason.

This is the problem that Villas-Boas has inherited and dealt with relatively well.

From the moment he became manager, the media hounded him on what he would do with Torres. In every instance he responded like a true professional, declaring his support of the striker even as he continued to go game after game without a goal.

However, fans, many of whom were optimistic about the potential for Torres in this new system, were beginning to murmur about when it was time to pull the plug on him after seeing a not-so-convincing preseason.

When the season finally arrived, the big mystery in West London was who would start up top, Torres or Drgoba? Torres would get the nod in Game 1, despite many believing Drogba was the better choice given Stoke’s size. In any event, he did not have a great game and was subbed out late.

The second game had the same starter. Again Torres struggled to really create and was pulled off two-thirds of the way through for Drogba.

Last Saturday against Norwich, Villas-Boas finally decided to have his hand at an old experiment. He switched to a more traditional 4-4-2 with both Torres and Drogba up top.

The trial resulted in no goals for either of them, but it was the best the pair had looked all season. They were feeding off each other's passes, playing in concert and simply attracting defense away from the midfield with that amount of striking force on the pitch.

With Dorgba expected to recover in time for the game against Sunderland after that terrifying collision with the Norwich keeper, it may behoove the boss to go ahead and throw the pair out there again. With Manchester United now three weeks away, if he can get those two to be consistent with one another, it gives them a real chance at Old Trafford.

After all, over the past few years no one has given the United backs as hard of a time as Torres and Drogba.

In the media, Villas-Boas has been as well versed as ever when confronted with this little puzzle. But when it comes down to how to solve it on the pitch, he is still looking for the right pieces.

Grade: C

Players' Response

For the fans this is an often overlooked category, but perhaps nothing influences a coach’s success more. The way the players respond to a manager is more important than victories, transfers or championships because it is the direct corollary to them.

Think about it like this: If you were to make a list of managers based on successful coaches in the Abramovich era, how would it look? Most would probably vary one or two spots, but I could almost guarantee we would all put Scolari at the bottom.

Well are you aware that under Scolari the team never dropped below fourth in the table and only stayed there for one week? Ancelotti's seven-game winless streak (the worst of the Abramovich era) had them dip all the way down to fifth and stay there for weeks.

So why was he not dismissed immediately in the middle of the season? Why is he not at the bottom of everyone’s list? Because in our eyes he was still a good guy because the players supported him.

Villas-Boas has done a tremendous job of earning the players' respect and admiration. Many have already publicly declared their pleasure in playing under him.

Cech stated his feelings early: "Andre is a great choice. He is young and he has proved that he can manage a big club to success. He knows English football and he knows our club—that will be a massive help."

Terry commented on comparisons to Villa-Boas as the "Special One":

"

"Clearly, he has learned from Jose and there are certain things where you think, 'That is very Mourinho-esque','' Terry said. "Jose didn't like anyone getting close to the players. We had a good relationship with him but there were days you wouldn't have gone near him. So you could have a laugh and a joke with Jose and that could change the following day.

That was the same with Andre when he was here and he's very much the same now as a manager.''

"

This seems to be the feeling throughout the clubhouse. With no off-field issues to report and no players wanting out (with the exception of Zhirkov), it can be assumed that Villas-Boas has won over the players.

Once you win over the players you can start to worry about winning games. Once you win games, you have happy fans and that’s all that really matters in sports to begin with.

Grade: A

Final Grade

Andre Villas-Boas has now been the Chelsea manager for just over two months, but in that short period of time he has really taken this club by the reins and made it his own. He developed a style unto himself at Porto which got him the job he has now.

To be the Chelsea manager it takes a certain quality that most do not have. It takes something that is inherent in one's persona and cannot be taught. It extends well beyond tactics, knowledge of the game or player relations. It requires an individual to manage doubt on a most extraordinary scale.

None have been able to do this so far.

A few have fared well, but it inevitably seeps in some way or another. Thus far, Villas-Boas has managed his doubt well. He has stood by what he has said and has not reneged on his decisions (you can read my article on doubt here).

Though the trials and errors of his tenure are under constant scrutiny from fans and media alike, he has managed it well and kept them to a minimum. Players seem to respect their leader and results have demonstrated that the team is on the right path.

To give someone an overall grade on two months of work can be somewhat trivial, but in the case of top-division football, nothing is below critics to judge and evaluate a man.

For a final grade, I give him a solid B-. He has not driven the team into the ground, but also has not exceeded the fantasies of the wildest fan. With the team looking better and better each week, it is looking like the grade could be on the rise very soon.

That is the paradox of sports. Within a second you could be king of the land, ruler of the sport world, champions of athletes. And the next, a washed-up mess, a has-been, a nobody.

This B- is a very fragile thing. After all, it could very easily jump to an A+ with a win over United in two weeks, or drop down further to a point of no recovery.

Final Grade: B-

Your Grades?

What do you think of these grades? How would you grade him yourself?