Chelsea surpassed expectations in Frank Lampard’s first season in charge by managing to secure a top 4 finish and also reach the FA Cup final. Despite the transfer embargo during the last 12 months, Chelsea played attractive football that saw them score lots of goals and only their inability to keep clean sheets on the road prevented them from finishing closer to the top 2. Still, the overall impression from Lampard’s first year was positive.
The team’s main strength was in attack, with Chelsea scoring lots of goals with great ease. The home form was solid all campaign too. Lampard impressed with introducing many youngsters into the first team - Tomori, James, Gilmour, Mount and Abraham had breakthrough seasons and established themselves as valuable first-team members.
Undoubtedly the major issue was the defence, with Chelsea unable to keep a single clean sheet in an away top-flight fixture for the first time since the 1950s! A huge weakness was defending corners with Chelsea having the worst corners-goals conceded ratio in the entire top flight!
Both Abraham and Giroud led the attack well, but the most consistent contributor from start to finish was Willian. The Brazilian’s form remained solid all campaign. Nothing similar can be said about goalkeeper Keppa, who not only made lots of mistakes, but also caused plenty of issues in the dressing room throughout the campaign.
Already bought impressive attacking reinforcements this summer (Timo Werner and Hakim Ziyech) and with lots of money to spend (the transfer embargo over now) Chelsea are expected to strengthen further. If as expected 1-2 new defenders also join, the Blues could easily challenge for the title next season.
