Why Chelsea could be set for transformation under Enzo Maresca in near future

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Chelsea welcome Sunderland to Stamford Bridge on Sunday and Enzo Maresca has spoken about how his side will deal with long throws

Chelsea may end up reverting to long throws in the future as they prepare to take on Sunderland, who have the second most launches in the box this season.

Only Brentford have thrown the ball inside the 18-yard box more in the Premier League than the Black Cats this term as they travel to Stamford Bridge this afternoon. The Blues conceded a late goal away at Brentford last month via a long throw-in and head coach Enzo Maresca has been showing his players the clip of that goal to remind them how not to deal with the danger.

“Absolutely, but we review [clips] not only this week because we play against Sunderland, also we faced teams already after Brentford that they were going with the long throw-ins,” Maresca said on Friday morning. “It's something that now again everyone, almost every team is doing that so we need to learn how to deal with that.”

The Chelsea head coach worked as an assistant manager to Pep Guardiola for the 2022/23 season, so long throw-ins are not really in his repertoire. However, Maresca has admitted he may have to evolve as a coach in the future with long throws becoming a much more common occurrence in the Premier League nowadays.

"If we don't do it then it because I don't like it,” Maresca said on long throws. “But I have said before in football you have to evolve so one day I might do it but at this moment we don't plan to use long throws."

He continued: “The long throw in now is like 10 years ago. Liam's [Delap] dad [Rory] was the king of the long throws and in case if we go for long throws we can swap. Liam can go home and we will bring in his dad!”

Chelsea will have to deal with the threat of Nordi Mukiele’s long throws at Stamford Bridge this afternoon as the Blues look to make it five victories on the bounce in all competitions. Marc Guiu is in contention for his first Premier League start for Chelsea since signing for the club in the summer of 2024.

The 19-year-old striker, who scored the opening goal of the Blues’ 5-1 win over Ajax in midweek, spent 26 days on loan at Sunderland at the start of the campaign before Chelsea recalled the Spaniard due to an injury to Liam Delap. Guiu has impressed in recent weeks, but that has only come about after a stern word from Maresca about how the striker was training.

“We had a chat with Marc two weeks ago, I told him that the way he was training I didn't like and he needs to change,” Maresca said. “He changes and he got a chance, so it is like that.” When pressed on how Guiu was not training well, Maresca replied: “In all the ways.”