The return of Marc Cucurella from injury for Chelsea couldn’t have been timed much better following injury setbacks to his teammates Ben Chilwell and Levi Colwill.
Blues head coach Mauricio Pochettino was starting to look desperately short of options in his squad to play left-back, but Marc Cucurella is fit again to fill that hole in the starting XI.
We’ve seen Cucurella, 25, have some real low moments in Chelsea colours since joining in the summer of 2022 from Brighton.
However, we’re convinced he can be crucial for the final couple of months of the season.
When you look at Cucurella’s performance on Monday night in the 3-2 league win over Newcastle United, it should give everyone confidence in him.
The 25-year-old defender hadn’t played a single minute since November because of injury, but he went straight into the line-up versus Newcastle and got a full 90 minutes into his legs. Most importantly, he looked very solid at left-back as well.
If we’ve got one criticism of Cucurella, he can sometimes be too rash in his 1v1 defending and too eager to win the ball.
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But we feel the Spaniard could still be a key individual for Chelsea moving forward if he changes one thing.
Where Marc Cucurella must change
We’ve referenced above the one red flag we’ve got with Cucurella’s game, which is his over eagerness to win back possession.
There’s nothing better than being tight to an opponent and stealing possession, but the smart defenders know that’s not always possible and they’ll retain great position.
For Cucurella, there’s several instances in his Chelsea career where he’s cost his side by making the same mistake of trying to steal the ball when it’s not there to be one. It happened a couple of days ago in the Newcastle win, too.
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He was rolled far too easily by Jacob Murphy in the middle of the park when he lunged in to try win the ball. As a result, the Newcastle winger turned away from him before scoring to make it 3-2 and create a needlessly nervous finish to the game.
GiveMeSport has claimed that Cucurella is a player that Chelsea want to sell at the end of the season. We’re wondering if he can change the club’s mind by finishing this campaign strongly in the next two months.
