A blog of two halves

Save 90,000 journeys

It isn’t a question of if, but when.

19 February 2019
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Maurizio Sarri, manager of Chelsea and ‘The man with no Plan B’. PICTURE: GETTY IMAGES

It isn't a question of if, but when. In a week bookended by defeats at the hands of Manchester clubs (after all, nobody gives Chelsea a prayer at Wembley in Sunday's League Cup final), the walls are closing in on Morrie Sarri.

'The man with no Plan B' will be etched on his tombstone after a predictably limp FA Cup exit at the hands of United at the Bridge, and an anticipated capitulation this weekend to Manchester City.

Indeed, why put everyone through another ritual humiliation? Let's save the planet, spare 90,000 journeys and courier the trophy to the Etihad.

Home fans were baying for compassionate euthanasia for Sarri after the 2-0 defeat to Ole Gunnar Solskjaer's rejuvenated United – a team which demonstrates what shrewd managerial change can achieve.

Chelsea fans even joined in United's chant of 'You're getting sacked in the morning', and booed the pointless substitution of captain Cesar Azpilicueta eight minutes from time.

The Blues had no answer to the Red Devils' two first-half breakaway goals in which defenders were by-passed and headers buried by first Ander Herrera and then Paul Pogba.

Chelsea simply cannot improve as a team under Sarri, and the expectation is that the board will simply follow United's lead, ditch the manager and bring in a caretaker, with Derby County's Frank Lampard the fans' choice.

Then Sarri can vanish and puff away to obscurity.

The views expressed in this blog are those of the author and unless specifically stated are not necessarily those of Hammersmith & Fulham Council.

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Tim Harrison

Tim is our Chelsea FC blogger.

He also writes our Shepherds Bush Cricket Club match reports during the football close season.

Tim has been writing Chelsea match reports since the late 1980s for newspapers and, more recently, websites.

When he first reported on the Blues, the press box was a metal cage suspended over the lip of the old west stand - and you reached it via a precarious walkway over the heads of the fans.

But he has been a Chelsea fan since his father took an excited seven-year-old to watch Chelsea v Manchester United in the mid 1960s... and covered his ears every time the chanting got too ripe.

In July 2005 he wrote The Rough Guide to Chelsea, published by Penguin, which sold 15,000 copies.

His favourite player of all time is Charlie Cooke, the mazy winger who lit up Chelsea's left wing in the 60s and 70s.

When he isn't watching the Blues, Tim acts, paints, writes and researches local history.

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