"It is the start of a really exciting period" – the words of Graham Potter with a beaming smile on his face back in September. A few months later, a photo did the rounds on Twitter. It was tongue-in-cheek, but it was an image comparing how Potter looked when he arrived as Chelsea head coach to how he looked on the touchline during one of the Blues' defeats.
"I was really, really excited with the new ownership and impressed by them, their vision for the club and what they want to achieve," Potter continued following his appointment. Who could blame him for being excited? He had just inherited a Chelsea squad full of talent and potential and one that had a major cash injection just weeks before his appointment.
The club's new ownership group, led by American business tycoon Todd Boehly, had spent way over £200million in improving the squad in the summer transfer window that had closed just days prior to Potter's appointment. The mass amount of signings meant that it was indeed a transitional period for the club in terms of what was happening on the pitch, as well as the numerous changes behind the scenes to the board and staff.
It was never going to be easy for Potter and when results – and notably performances – started to drop off massively, his tone quickly changed. The beaming smile was gone.
"Change is challenging in any organisation," Potter explained after his Chelsea team dropped to 10th place in the Premier League table in January. "The change [of ownership] happened for events outside of us so it is not like there is some sort of coup going on. This is what it is.
"We have to deal with the new now and we have to build things up again because things have changed, things have gone, people have left. That was part of the challenge to come [here].
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"I understood that was going to be really difficult. I just thought from a leadership perspective, it is fascinating, challenging and stimulating and ridiculously hard.
"I think this is probably the hardest job in football because of that leadership change and because of the expectations and because of rightly where people see Chelsea. And obviously, I didn't think we would lose 10 first-team players [to injury] as well."
Those comments from Potter sparked widespread anger. How can a club that has £200m to spend on transfer business solely be the "hardest job in football"? But Potter had a point.
Everything in football is relative. Chelsea's finances do not compare to a club like Grimsby Town, for instance, and that is meant with absolutely no disrespect. But the pressure to manage a club – nay, an institution like Chelsea – is enormous. It is constant pressure. It has got to be exhausting.
All of the way through Potter's less-than-eight-month tenure at Stamford Bridge, sources told football.london that Chelsea viewed the head coach as the right man to lead the club's ambitious and long-term vision. But when results started going against Chelsea, to a point where the supporters were booing the team and the manager off the pitch, the ownership decided to take action.
Then a well-thought-out and lengthy process to decide who would take over from Potter was conducted. And after weeks of speculation, Mauricio Pochettino was named as that man on May 19. The Argentine will begin his new role on July 1.
There will be times in Pochettino's debut season with Chelsea where results will not go his way, and performances for that matter, because the club, once again, are in a transitional period. The only way they can get out of such a phase is by backing Pochettino. Fully back him, even when times are hard, and he will repay their faith eventually.
There is such a job on his hands, though, that it will take time. His first season is going to be tough and the expectation from the board and supporters has to be lower – as difficult as that may be for some fans to swallow.
What actually constitutes what we call 'success' for the Argentine in his first season? Chelsea will not be playing any form of European football next season, so the fixture list will be less congested for the Blues, and with that, there should be a focus on getting back up the Premier League table and into those spots once again.
However, the Premier League is more competitive than ever. Manchester City are in a world of their own, as showcased by their treble-clinching Champions League final win against Inter Milan at the weekend. Arsenal looked very good last season, as did Manchester United at times.
Newcastle United look like a side that will just keep improving with every transfer window that goes by. Liverpool have to improve on what was a really disappointing 2022/23 for them. You also have an under-performing Tottenham under new management and that's without even mentioning two overachievers in Brighton and Aston Villa. Getting back into those European spots is going to be anything but easy for Pochettino in his first season.
So if he can manage a Europa League finish in 2023/24, then that has to count as a 'success' when looking at the bigger picture. The biggest thing for Pochettino is implementing his style to the squad he will inherit next month. Once players start understanding and executing said style, then that's when Chelsea get out of the transitional period we've mentioned so often.
It is going to be tough. There's no doubt about that. There will be loads of lows and hopefully plenty of highs, too. But one thing is for sure: the owners and fans need to back Pochettino. He is the man who can transform the fortunes of this football club.
Let us know in the comment section below what you believe will be a 'success' in Mauricio Pochettino's first season at Chelsea...
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