The first month of the 2022/23 campaign wasn’t the smoothest start to a Premier League season Chelsea have ever had.
The Blues won just one of their first three league games, and even that victory was a marginal 1-0 win over Everton who themselves were and still are in a period of transition.
Fast forward exactly a month into the season and Thomas Tuchel was sacked as Blues boss after what looked like a very concerning 1-0 loss to Dinamo Zagreb in Matchday 1 of the Champions League.
From back to front, the players looked lost, a far cry from what Chelsea fans were accustomed to seeing under Tuchel.
That Zagreb loss however, saw one man missing from the squad – Thiago Silva. The Brazilian had played all 450 minutes of league football before he was omitted from the squad for the clash against the Croatians, proving in those minutes that even at the age of 37, he was the jewel in Chelsea’s defence.
Signing for the club on a free transfer from Paris Saint Germain in 2020, questions arose over whether Silva would be able to handle the fast-paced nature of the Premier League after spending eight years in Ligue 1.
It wasn’t the easiest start for him, with Blues fans no doubt able to remember Chelsea’s 3-3 draw with West Brom under Frank Lampard in the 2020/21 season, with Silva not enjoying the best debut to start his career in England.
But my oh my, how the tables have turned. The Brazilian has since gone on to become a club legend at Stamford Bridge, high praise for a player who has only just surpassed two years at the club. A Champions League trophy has certainly elevated many players’ statuses at the club, but you could argue that even if Chelsea hadn’t beaten Manchester City on that famous night in Porto, Silva would still to this day be held in equally high regard.
You just have to look at the outrageously consistent performances he puts in at the back even when the rest of his teammates are slacking and how he rarely puts a foot wrong, proving just how valuable his 18 years of senior experience are to this Chelsea team that is beginning to get younger by the season.
That’s in no small part thanks to Todd Boehly and his new recruitment team of Christopher Vivell, Paul Winstanley and Joe Shields. Their fresh recruitment drive has seen them transform this Chelsea team from the ground up. Over £700million has been spent since the summer with £300million of that coming in January.
You can look at the shiny big-time names in Enzo Fernandez, Joao Felix and Mykhailo Mudryk which got fans squealing with joy when they walked through the Cobham doors, but one man has come in under the radar and helped reinvigorate the Chelsea backline.
Benoit Badiashile came into the club at the start of January from Monaco for £32.7million amidst the fans’ desperate cries for other high-profile defenders like Josko Gvardiol and Matthijs De Ligt, and the 21-year old has slotted almost seamlessly into the left centreback role for Graham Potter.
Despite seeing just one win in those four games, the master and the apprentice have kept three clean sheets with neither looking a hair out of place amid the major squad reshuffle and gelling period that the team is going through.
Chelsea’s 1-0 loss to Borussia Dortmund last Wednesday was a tough one to take, but much like when Silva was left out of the squad to face Zagreb, the Blues had to deal with the omission of Badiashile against the Germans as he was not selected as one of the three new signings to be part of the knockout rounds of the UCL, so make of it what you will that when one of the two are out of the squad, Chelsea can’t seem to get a result.
Add to that Chelsea’s disastrous 1-0 defeat to Southampton on Saturday, where Badiashile looked a shade of himself alongside an out-of-form Kalidou Koulibaly with Silva being rested by Potter, perhaps the immediate split of an inform central defensive duo didn’t help the backline of a team that desperately needed a win against the Premier League’s basement boys.
Badiashile, one of a rare breed of left-footed center-backs on the continent, wasn’t heralded as this fantastic signing when he arrived because he wasn’t this name that had performed on the world stage whilst being quoted at an outrageous price. He is playing well beyond his age alongside someone 17 years his senior and him and Silva look like they have been playing together for decades when they do take to the field as a pair.
Do these recent poor performances prove just how important Silva is to this Chelsea team? It’s very hard to argue against the suggestion.
You can have your shouts for Gabriel and Saliba, Dias and Laporte or Martinez and Varane, but if Badiashile and Silva can keep up this level of performance when together for the rest of the season and going into 2023/24, we could well be looking at some blue ribbons on the Premier League trophy come May next year.
Written by Luka Foley (@LukaFoleySPJ)
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