“Lampard didn’t necessarily want Kai Havertz” – Chelsea’s recruitment strategy shows why Frank Lampard may be struggling | OneFootball

We’ve all seen certain managers pipe up over and over that they lost their job because they weren’t properly backed in the transfer market, but is there such a thing as being overly backed?

Real Madrid’s Galactico era is the defining example of why you can’t just throw multiple superstars on the pitch and expect to win, but it does look like Chelsea are having a similar issue where Frank Lampard just has too many players to work with.

You could also argue that he’s further struggling due to new arrivals that he doesn’t really know what to do with, but the finances dictate that they have to start and that’s upset the entire dynamic of his team.

Kai Havertz joined Chelsea in the summer for a fee of around £71m per The BBC so he was expected to be the player that would take Chelsea to the next level, but it actually looks like Lampard wasn’t that bothered about his arrival:

Havertz was an absolute star at Leverkusen because everything was built around him and his qualities, but that can never be the case at Chelsea when they have so many star names to fit into one side.

It really does look like Lampard is being forced to pick a squad of names rather than a team at this point, and that would explain why he’s struggling so much this season compared to last year.

When he first took over his team had an identity and you could see there was a togetherness on the field, but the current squad is just too big and it does look like Lampard has to prioritise keeping everyone happy rather than trying to impose a style and philosophy on the squad.

Obviously there are other reasons why Chelsea are struggling just now, but a recruitment policy which isn’t in line with what a manager is looking for will always be doomed to failure.