MARCEL DESAILLY reckons former club Chelsea are struggling to impress for one key reason.
The Blues sit 13th in the Premier League table with just three wins in 10 games under Mauricio Pochettino.
Things get even harder for the Argentine when he returns to Tottenham on Monday, with his old side unbeaten and top of the table.
Chelsea have spent £1billion since Todd Boehly replaced Roman Abramovich in 2022.
Yet despite an incredible turnover of players during the summer, the London outfit are still struggling to gel.
Chelsea have turned their attention to expensive youngsters, handing out massive eight-year contracts to build a team for the future.
But former captain Desailly reckons the Blues have made a major mistake in neglecting experience.
The ex-defender joined Chelsea from AC Milan after leading France to World Cup glory in 1998.
Desailly etched his name in the Stamford Bridge history books with FA Cup and Super Cup glory.
He was 30 years old when he moved to London, and left naysayers eating humble pie as he clocked up 222 appearances in six seasons.
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Desailly believes Chelsea’s new kids lack the know-how to play football at the highest level.
He reckons it will take years to foster a winning mentality due to the profile of recent signings.
But Desailly notes the youngsters Chelsea have snapped up are all showing world-class potential.
And with a bit of patience, things could click together to create an almighty side.
Desailly explained to Get French Football News: “It’s very hard to criticise.
“The only thing I’d say is that it is an error of communication. They are carried away by the potential that each player they’ve bought has.
“They’ve forgotten about one element, knowing that to play football at the highest level…
“To attain what we call in French ‘la culture de la gagne’, the winning mentality, you need experience.
“Nascent talent is never enough to presume immediate performance.
“And thats the only thing where I’d say they’ve made a mistake, where they keep thinking with Pochettino ‘no, this year we’ll be title challengers with the team we have’.
“Right from the start of the season you could see they can’t be title challengers.
“But they have put together players of great potential and have positioned themselves in terms of business, because if they didn’t buy the players now for a little above value, they wouldn’t have been able to buy them later.”
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