Now heading towards 350 appearances in all competitions for the club, Chelsea goalkeeper Petr Cech can be considered as something of a veteran for The Blues. Bursting onto the scene in 2004, he played a huge part in Chelsea’s back-to-back title triumphs. But, recently a string of high profile errors have opened up the Czech international to a barrage of criticism, which is even starting to creep on from quarters of his own fans.
So, just what has gone wrong for him? Obviously the serious head injury in 2007 played a part, but now almost 5 years on, he should have fully recovered mentally from this. There are other issues, and his performances are hindering Chelsea – even if they choose to ignore this issue.
The main issue is that Chelsea, for years now, have opted to have no real competiton to Cech for the number 1 jersey. Since the departure of Carlo Cudicini, there has been no quality waiting in the ranks to pounce upon any dip in form from Cech, and as a result of this he has become complacent. A lack of pressure from within the club is un-healthy, and unarguably serious detrimental.
Cech has become embroiled in discussing the club’s issues in recent years, yet never talking about his own performance. The state of mind that whatever happens, he will always be the first name on that team sheet, is having an appaling effect on Chelsea’s situation. His distribution in the last few seasons has been nothing short of wasteful, a notable example the goal Maxi Rodriguez scored at Stamford Bridge earlier this season. When Arsenal visited, Cech was at fault for 3 of the 5 goals shipped.
In the recent game against Everton he failed to deal with a shot straight at him and the game was lost. Such errors simply cannot happen with alarming regularity, yet nothing done or talking about them. Ross Turnbull or Hilario are nowhere near the needed standard in the Premier League, and Chelsea’s poor second choice options mean they have to persevere with a goalkeeper who simply isn’t performing well enough.
Two examples right under the noses of Chelsea prove this point. First look at Newcastle. Tim Krul came up out of the ranks to provide experienced Steve Harper with this competition, usurped him to the starting berth, and now is being widely acclaimed as one of the stars of the season.
Can anybody imagine 36 year old Hilario or Turnbull with only 29 top flight appearances making that step up? Almost certainly not. Aside from Krul rising up to become first choice, Newcastle then went and signed another hotly rated goalkeeper, Rob Elliot from Charlton. The 25 year old is adding more pressure, and the results in Krul’s performances are there for all to see.
The other example in the Premiership is that of Bolton. Long serving Jussi Jaaskelainen, having played 519 times to date for The Trotters, picked up an injury earlier in the season. In came relatively unknown Hungarian Adam Bogdan, and he’s proved more than an adequate replacement, including a penalty save from Wayne Rooney at Old Trafford. Now, Bogdan starts despite Jaaskelainen being fully fit, and the Finnish international is left on the bench.
It must be noted that Chelsea did sign a new shot stopper back in July, Thibault Courtouis from Genk. He’s out on loan at Athletico Madrid – and has been in superb form in 2012 so far – and anybody following the situation developing in goal at Stamford Bridge must be in agreement that he must come in next season is Cech doesn’t step it up.
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