Chelsea are back in pre-season training. What issues must Enzo Maresca address?
Enzo Maresca's team only have time to play two friendlies at Stamford Bridge — against Bayer Leverkusen on August 8 and against AC Milan on August 10 — before their new Premier League campaign begins at home to Crystal Palace on August 17.
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No club has faced such a tight turnaround between seasons in modern history, but Chelsea and Maresca are confident that they are equipped to handle it.
As they begin to gear up at lightning speed for the new season, The Athletic addresses some of the key questions being posed to the Chelsea head coach and his squad.
Chelsea released their first pictures of pre-season training on Monday and there was no holiday fat to be seen. That should come as no surprise: modern elite footballers tend to stay in good shape all year round, maintaining a healthy diet and exercising every day, on their own or with personal fitness coaches, even when not on the clock for their clubs.
Those ingrained habits were what Chelsea were counting on. Ramping up preparations for competitive action quickly is only feasible if players are building from a solid base of fitness, which all the indications suggest they are. Re-establishing the level of specialised conditioning that footballers need to see them through a 10-month season is the next challenge.
The most positive sight of all from Chelsea's first day back at Cobham was Wesley Fofana training with the first-team group as he continues his recovery from hamstring surgery in April.
Maresca's inspired game plan against Paris Saint-Germain was not an unrecognisable shift from his default approach, but it did feature some notable changes. Cole Palmer started on the right wing rather than as the No 10 and drifted inside, while Malo Gusto pushed high up as an overlapping, rather than inverting, right-back. Robert Sanchez also kicked long often.
These were gambits tailored to target what Maresca had identified as PSG's specific weaknesses, so don't expect to see them every week. He has the personnel in almost every area of the pitch to make selection decisions in response to certain match-ups, and Chelsea's tougher schedule in 2025-26 will necessitate greater rotation in any case.
But the fundamentals will remain the same: Chelsea will line up in a 4-2-3-1 that, one way or another, becomes a 3-4-3 in possession with a box midfield. Beyond that, much will depend on opponents' strengths, weaknesses and tactical approaches.
Chelsea's unwanted players have been working separately at Cobham for almost a month, building their fitness while they and their representatives work on finding moves elsewhere.
There has already been considerable progress on that front: Joao Felix signed for Al Nassr in a deal that could be worth up to €50million (£43.5m; $57.8m) last week, while goalkeepers Djordje Petrovic and Kepa Arrizabalaga have joined Bournemouth and Arsenal respectively. Burnley have also agreed to buy striker Armando Broja and midfielder Lesley Ugochukwu in separate deals.
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But there is much more work to do. Raheem Sterling and Ben Chilwell are the two headline names with markets that have been slow to develop, while Axel Disasi, Renato Veiga and Carney Chukwuemeka are also prime sale candidates. Chelsea always expected several of these situations to be resolved later in the summer window.
Maresca's preparations for the new season are punctuated by a friendly double-header at Stamford Bridge this weekend, with Leverkusen their opponents on Friday evening and Milan their visitors on Sunday afternoon. Expect to see almost wholesale rotation of the starting XI with less than 48 hours between the two games, and plenty of substitutions.
Maresca was notably cautious with the newer faces in his squad at the Club World Cup. Every outfield player made it onto the pitch in the United States, but the bulk of Chelsea's minutes in the competition were soaked up by the core of the group who delivered a fourth-place finish in the Premier League in 2024-25 and lifted the UEFA Conference League.
Liam Delap and Joao Pedro were the only real exceptions to this rule, though Andrey Santos also stepped up impressively at the base of midfield when Moises Caicedo missed the quarter-final against Palmeiras due to suspension. Of the summer arrivals (or in the case of Santos, a return), these three look best placed to play significant roles in the early weeks.
Many supporters will be intrigued to get a look at Estevao, who arrives at Stamford Bridge with considerable hype and shone against Chelsea in the Club World Cup. But alongside the excitement, there is also a recognition within the club that the 18-year-old will need time to adjust to his new surroundings and to adapt to English football. He will be eased in.
On the left flank, a lack of natural alternatives may mean that Jamie Gittens is elevated quickly towards starting status, though Maresca has shown a willingness to deploy Pedro Neto and even Palmer on that side at times and Joao Pedro is regarded as being versatile enough to function across the attacking line.
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Jorrel Hato is another who will likely see the pitch for the first time against Leverkusen or Milan, but the fitness and form of Marc Cucurella mean there is no urgent rush to assimilate him.
Three of Chelsea's other exciting young acquisitions this summer — Kendry Paez, Mike Penders and Mamadou Sarr — will spend this season developing at BlueCo sister club Strasbourg.
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