At least for now, the pressure on Potter is reduced
Graham Potter looks set to last at least a little bit longer as Chelsea’s head coach.
The under-fire manager got the result he desperately needed, with Chelsea advancing in the Champions League by coming back from a one-goal deficit with a 2-0 second leg victory over Borussia Dortmund.
Despite their recent struggles, a largely confident Blues side left goalkeeper Kepa Arrizabalaga with little to do at Stamford Bridge. Goals from Raheem Sterling and Kai Havertz — the former indisputable, the second the source of significant controversy — paved the way to a critical win.
Early on, it looked like Chelsea might continue to torment their fans, controlling much of the match but failing to turn that into the needed goal. Most notably, Havertz hit the post midway through the first half, and then had his 38th minute goal chalked off after Sterling was caught offside earlier in the sequence.
Sterling would at last provide the crucial breakthrough, as the England attacker made up for whiffing on Ben Chilwell’s initial cross to collect himself and power a shot past Dortmund goalkeeper Alexander Meyer in the 44th minute.
Chelsea’s relief was palpable, but this year at least, the Blues never seem to take the easy way. Marius Wolf was caught handling a cross early in the second half, with Havertz eventually stepping up to the spot.
His stutter-step got Meyer to give away his intentions, leaving Havertz with an open half of the shoot into. Fans were already celebrating, but Havertz’ casual shot hit the foot of the post before bouncing away to safety.
However, Chelsea would be saved by another VAR intervention: replays showed that four Dortmund players (and three more from Chelsea) were all clearly guilty of encroachment as Havertz struck the ball.
Referee Danny Makkelie — much to the chagrin of Dortmund players, who offered a solid minute of remonstrations — gave a re-take (as is required by the Laws of the Game when both teams encroach). Havertz and Meyer re-enacted the exact same sequence, but this time the forward’s aim was slightly better.
Fortunate? Certainly, but maybe Chelsea has been overdue a bit of luck. The goal marked the first time in 2023 that they’d scored more than one goal in a given game.
They couldn’t manage a third, something they still haven’t done under Potter. Conor Gallagher came in off the bench to finish off a 75th minute break against a stretched Dortmund defense, but once again Sterling was caught offside in the build-up. Yet again, Potter and the crowd at Stamford Bridge were denied a chance to exhale.
Dortmund finally mounted some late pressure on Arrizabalaga’s goal, but a handful of shots went straight at the Chelsea goalkeeper, and the Blues held on for a deserved win.
Pressure on Potter reduced…for now
Chelsea’s place in the Champions League’s final eight may have been something of an obligation no matter the circumstances, but for Potter, overcoming a 1-0 first leg deficit to advance may have been a requirement to keep his job.
“There was a fantastic feeling in the dressing room. We have been through a tough period and this competition means a lot for us,” Potter told BT Sport after the match. “We wanted to progress and get into the last eight and it sets us up for the next few weeks… It is great for the boys, two clean sheets after a tough period. You get that in life and it is about how you respond and the players have been fantastic.”
Chelsea’s struggles over the past four months have seen them tumble down to 10th place in the Premier League, and they’ve been eliminated from both domestic cup competitions to boot.
Potter’s tenure began on a positive note: he debuted with a 1-1 Champions League group stage against RB Salzburg, but Chelsea then fired off five straight wins, and at one point held opponents scoreless across 622 consecutive minutes.
However, a 4-1 loss to Potter’s previous club Brighton on October 29 seemed to throw them off course. That game started a rotten run that has seen them lose 12 times out of 20 games, and includes a 4-0 loss to Manchester City in the FA Cup (Pep Guardiola’s side also knocked Chelsea out of the Carabao Cup in this span), as well as home losses to Arsenal and relegation strugglers Southampton.
That run would have put Potter under quite a bit of pressure anyway. Coming after Todd Boehly’s new ownership group spent $392 million transfer outlay this winter (and just shy of another $300 million over the summer), Chelsea wasn’t expecting to be mid-table strugglers who rarely score. They’re supposed to win, and win right now, in style.
Getting into March 17’s quarterfinal draw will relieve some of that pressure, but only briefly. Four of Chelsea’s next five matches in the league are against teams from the bottom half of the table. Further slip-ups would mitigate their success against Dortmund to such an extent that those quarterfinal fixtures could see Potter battling for his job all over again.
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