Chelsea manager Frank Lampard admits he’s worried, as reports have circulated about his termination being imminent. One report, by The Athletic, says the west London club already know what they want in a successor, and it’s someone who can speak German.
The Roman Abramovich tenure at Stamford Bridge has also been marked by rapid turnover in managers, once every 14 months on average. Lampard, currently in his second season, lasted much more than a calendar year and a couple months, so he’s above the arithmetic mean in longevity already.
Having a very itchy trigger finger, when it comes to sacking the manager, is certainly a trait as synonymous with Abramovich as his fleet of superyachts. Lampard has probably lasted this long, and he might be given a little more rope yet, certainly more leeway than most, because of who he is, but at the end of the day, the buck stops with him.
The Blues splashed the cash, especially in the final third, this summer but the goals aren’t there. They’ve only scored eight times in their last eight, and that’s resulted in just two wins over that span. They are eighth in the table, but all but two of the teams in front of them have at least one game in hand on them. Two of the teams above them have two games in hand on Chelsea.
“I am worried about the slump,” Lampard said after the 2-0 loss to Leicester City yesterday. “from the form we were in to get so quickly into the form we’re now… five losses in eight isn’t where we want to be.
“We were in a really good place in December, second in the league and two points from the top. Maybe complacency set in. There’s only one way out of it which is hard work.
“It is clearly concerning. It is a period we are not happy with, other clubs have been in that period. All we can think about is getting through the period, working hard. The important thing is the players bounce back. This is the cut-throat nature of what it is.”
Lampard is of course saying all the right things, one could argue, or at least espousing the narratives he has to in order to ease the pressure on him right now. However, Chelsea finished fourth last season, and the expectations this season were nothing short of Premier League title contention.
At this point, they’ll be fortunate just to get back into the top four. Lampard is clearly in the 11th hour of his managerial regime, and if he doesn’t turn it around immediately, he’ll get axed sooner rather than later.
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank, partnered with News Now. Banks, the author of “No, I Can’t Get You Free Tickets: Lessons Learned From a Life in the Sports Media Industry,” has regularly appeared in WGN, Sports Illustrated, Chicago Tribune and SB Nation. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram.