By Frank Dalleres
It has been six weeks since two 47-year-olds took on the biggest jobs of their careers and it’s fair to say that it has gone better for Graham Potter than Liz Truss.
While Truss was forced out of Downing Street after 44 catastrophic days as Prime Minster, new Chelsea manager Potter has enjoyed a serene start to life in another infamous hotseat.
Wednesday night’s goalless draw at fellow west Londoners Brentford represented a rare bump in what has so far been a smooth road from Brighton and Hove Albion.
Potter has achieved five wins and two draws from his seven matches in charge, a run that has lifted Chelsea back into the Premier League top four and firmly on track for the last 16 of the Champions League.
He can mark his own 44-day milestone with a first major domestic scalp when the Blues travel north to face Manchester United on Saturday evening.
What the numbers say
Chelsea’s improvement in results since Potter replaced Thomas Tuchel is perhaps unsurprisingly mirrored in many of their key performance metrics.
They are scoring more goals per game, with an average of 1.86 in Potter’s seven matches compared with 1.14 in the seven matches this season under Tuchel.
They are also conceding far fewer, down from 1.42 per game to just 0.29 since. Wednesday made it five clean sheets in a row; it is now 553 minutes since the Blues let in a goal.
That increase in goals scored is helped by the fact Chelsea are taking more shots per game (12.8) than before (8).
Intriguingly, despite conceding far fewer goals they have seen a slight increase in the number of shots against them.
Average possession is also down from 62.4 per cent to 59.1 per cent, suggesting they are being more efficient at what they do rather than enjoying greater dominance.
What has changed?
One factor in their greater defensive stability may be Kepa Arrizabalaga’s usurping of goalkeeping rival Edouard Mendy.
Mendy’s erratic displays saw Kepa take his place just before Potter arrived and the Englishman has been rewarded for sticking with the former Athletic Bilbao stopper.
Other players to have enjoyed a boost include Mason Mount, who scored his first Chelsea goals of the season in last weekend’s win at Aston Villa.
Potter has flitted between a three-man defence and a back four, but emphasised that his tactical principles remained consistent when quizzed by Brentford manager Thomas Frank on Amazon Prime Video this week.
“We don’t really see the formation as the end goal, we see that as how the team’s playing,” he said.
“The team has to look consistent regardless of the formation and then it’s about the personnel, how you want to attack the opponent. Hopefully there are things that look the same even though the shape changes.”
United have enjoyed a revival of their own following a bad start to Erik ten Hag’s first season, yet their metrics are inferior to Potter’s Chelsea’s in just about every department, according to data from Sporting Risk.
On Wednesday they deservedly beat Tottenham Hotspur 2-0, their third win against a member of the Premier League’s Big Six already this season, after victories over Arsenal and Liverpool.
All of those have come at Old Trafford, however. It remains to be seen whether they can punch above their weight away from home too.
Chelsea currently lie one point above United, meaning they can open up a significant gap in the fight for a top-four finish by beating Ten Hag’s men on Saturday.
It also offers Potter the chance to maintain precious momentum, with fixtures against Arsenal, Newcastle and – in the EFL Cup – Manchester City before next month’s World Cup break.
As in politics, a few weeks can feel like a long time in football.
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