“I don’t think it’s a lack of effort,” Enzo Maresca said when asked about Christopher Nkunku’s lack of goals, assists and, well, anything at all for Chelsea of late ahead of the game.
His five goals in the Conference League make him the second-highest goalscorer in the competition, but he drew a blank across two legs against the first opponent of any real note in Copenhagen in the last 16 and again here, with no assists and now a penalty miss to boot. Legia Warsaw may have lost 3-0 but we doubt any of those players will have left the field as downcast as the Chelsea forward.
Nineteen goal contributions in just over 1900 minutes this season suggests he’s a) had a more than serviceable campaign and b) hasn’t been used nearly enough by Maresca, but those goals/assists coming against Servette (2), Gent, Panathinaikos, FC Noah (3), Heidenheim, Shamrock Rovers (2), Bournemouth, Southampton (4), Morecambe and Barrow (3) paints a different picture made damning by the opponents he’s failed to register against.
Starts against Manchester City, Ipswich, Brighton (2), Aston Villa, Leicester, Arsenal, Brentford, Newcastle, Copenhagen (2) and Legia Warsaw yielded nothing, which would be defensible if he was stretching defences, winning free-kicks and playing his part in the build-up like his competition for the No.9 role, Nicolas Jackson. But he just doesn’t. Games pass him by.
And while Maresca is adamant Nkunku is putting in the hard yards and we don’t sign up to the view that Body Language Is Everything, it’s been very hard to come to any conclusion other than the Frenchman not giving two shiny sh*ts about playing for Chelsea when he looks so goddamn miserable the entire time.
The excuse arrives roughly 30 minutes into every game he starts after various instances of failing to cut the mustard: He’s not a striker. Maresca said as much in December and again in February, and while his hand was somewhat forced by injuries to Jackson and Marc Guiu, continuing to field him in that role now Jackson has returned feels almost cruel.
It wasn’t him but Tyrique George who followed in Reece James’ fierce drive from the edge of the box to give Chelsea the lead, before Nkunku’s run was ignored by Jadon Sancho in favour of a pass to Noni Madueke for the second, but the real gut punch came in the 74th minute.
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Nkunku had dropped into his favoured No.10 role by that stage and was far more effective. It was his driving run at the Legia Warsaw defence that resulted in the penalty that he was always going to take in a bid to rebuild confidence that must have reached a career low.
He went for power over precision and of course the goalkeeper went the right way, briefly celebrating before picking the ball out of his net 30 seconds later as Sancho again found Madueke to score the third of the game. We didn’t notice Nkunku among the players rushing to celebrate a goal which will surely see Chelsea through to the next round on their cakewalk to the unprecedented European treble, and frankly, we don’t blame him.
The concern for the Chelsea bosses will be that his price tag is dropping with each game he plays. Reports suggest they wanted to recoup most of the £55m they paid for Nkunku in 2023, but it’s becoming increasingly difficult to put the negatives aside and see that There’s A Player Still In There.
There probably is – in his brief cameos last season we were convinced he was the best finisher in the Chelsea squad and the most likely saviour amid the xG disaster – but there’s no future for him now at Stamford Bridge, or as a No.9 anywhere, as Maresca knows as well as anyone despite mercilessly setting him up for failure.
