Who annoyed Enzo Maresca as Chelsea star Estevao Willian makes brilliant Liam Delap decision

Chelsea must be a seasonal team. When the sun is shining, they look really good. As winter draws in, they tend to hibernate.

This is overly simplistic but performances over the past 12 months have followed the trend. Exceptions include last year's pre-season, which was largely poor despite being in a baking America, and how their bad run didn't start until late December 2024, when it had been miserable weather wise for a while before.

Maybe it is not mere coincidence that the struggles of Enzo Maresca's first season coincided with a blustery early afternoon kick off at Goodison Park which made any sort of actual football near impossible, though. However, with the temperature rising again, they have found a mojo which promises to fuel their early season ambitions.

Their condensed pre-season, squeezed into a fortnight with two matches in three days over the weekend, was played in heat that lived up to the VisitMalta sponsoring. It was some way from the conditions of New York or Philadelphia, but nevertheless still extremely taxing.

It didn't stop them from going two from two across an almost perfect weekend at Stamford Bridge. Here, football.london goes through some of the finer points from the 4-1 win over Milan.

Maresca watch

A similar section was done for Friday's game against Bayer Leverkusen with Maresca mostly extremely warm towards his players. Apart from a moan at Tyrique George at one point, he was complimentary and applauded plenty of their work.

On this occasion, the manager was more critical. Chelsea offered plenty moving forward with the ball yet again, both before and after the red card which turned this more into an unserious training game at points; but when defending they were much more open.

Within the first minute they had allowed Milan to slice through their midfield only for Moises Caicedo to pop up and cut out Rafael Leao. Milan made very little of their few opportunities but did enter some dangerous areas which frustrated Maresca.

He voiced this clearly in the first half when shouting towards Enzo Fernandez. The Argentine was the only outfielder named in the squad against Leverkusen not to play and did look a bit rusty in his first minutes for almost a month.

Mistiming a press and giving away a foul on the edge of the Milan box, Fernandez drew a cry from Maresca who turned to his bench and said "Enzo, Enzo."

It wasn't the only situation in which the head coach was left disappointed with the coordination of his team. Chelsea's press was certainly off and allowed Milan to play through the lines. Fortunately for Chelsea, Leao was unable to generate big chances from his one-on-ones with Tosin Adarabioyo, and very little else came.

Josh Acheampong also saw the wrong side of Maresca when Chelsea were forced into taking off Trevoh Chalobah through injury. The plan had been for substitutions at 60 minutes but Chalobah went down and needed treatment. He was unable to carry on and Acheampong was called back from his pitchside warmup early.

After Maresca called over to the Cobham graduate, another coach had to get his attention. Then, as Chelsea and Milan played pinball during an end-to-end interaction, Maresca turned to see Acheampong still getting changed.

He urgently asked for the teenager to get himself ready only to be annoyed when Acheampong was unable to come on. Chelsea almost conceded when playing with 10-men themselves.

Once on, Acheampong then got another call from Maresca after jumping out of position at the wrong time. He made up for it with an athletic and well-timed block but was not in his manager's good books.

Double Estevao assist

Chelsea's new attacking talent looks to be the ideal teammate. Not only did he celebrate Joao Pedro's late second against Leverkusen with enthusiasm from the bench, enjoying watching on as his fellow Brazilian got yet another moment of joy, but he twice helped Liam Delap to score against Milan.

It was Estevao who was fouled, once more popping up at the back post, this time despite playing centrally, from Delap's low cross to win the penalty. Then, having picked up the ball as if to take the spot kick, he eventually gave it to Delap.

Given Estevao is already taking set pieces for Chelsea and is a trusted member of the squad, he would have been entitled to the penalty after winning it. One of the questions around the team has been who is on penalties when Cole Palmer is off the pitch.

Estevao had that responsibility at Palmeiras but handed it over to Chelsea's new No.9, who duly smashed in for a first goal at Stamford Bridge.

Towelling down

It's already been mentioned just how hot it was at SW6. Not only was there a water break in both halves, which Maresca used to deliver instructions to his team, but there were also other additions.

Pre-game, a member of staff for Chelsea delivered a set of towels to the players on the bench, running out from the tunnel and handing them over to those sat down ready to watch. With very little cover in front of the East Stand, Benoit Badiashile gleefully accepted.

He put the towel straight onto his head to try and find some shade. Sat next to Wesley Fofana and Romeo Lavia, Badiashile joined his fellow injured French speakers in trying to remain as cool as possible.

Maresca would later comment that Chalobah only wanted to come off so he could have a rest and get out of the sun. If Chelsea are aware of how their results correlate, they'll be desperate for it to stick around a while longer.