Why did Chelsea sack Graham Potter? Injury crisis, results expose Stamford Bridge tension

After a 2-0 loss to Aston Villa, Chelsea made the bold call to sack their second manager of the season as Graham Potter was given his marching orders from Stamford Bridge on April 2, 2023.

The former Brighton coach had struggled since arriving at the Blues in September 2022 and won just 12 of his 31 matches in charge. 

While Potter has taken Chelsea into the Champions League quarter finals this season, the side have struggled in the Premier League and find themselves sitting in 11th at the time of his departure. 

Despite some high-profile signings like Joao Felix and Enzo Fernandez, Potter was unable to get his side clicking and the Blues quickly ran out of patience as their 2022/23 risked ending in complete disappointment. 

MORE: Chelsea’s worst Premier League finishes

Graham Potter compared to other Chelsea managers

On the face of things, it was not looking great for Potter. Chelsea did not muster a shot of any description during the first half against City as they bowed out of the FA Cup in the third round for the first time since 1998. Things hardly improved in the defeat by Fulham.

The Blues did not have a touch inside the City box until the 54th minute and their overall xG of 0.09 was their lowest expected goals figure in five seasons.

Recent history continues to be unkind when comparing Potter’s record to his predecessors. Counting from Andre Villas-Boas’ ill-fated reign in 2011/12, Potter has the lowest points-per-game return across all competitions of any permanent Chelsea manager, despite the considerably smaller sample size of 31 games in charge (for the purposes of this, assume that all competitions follow a league format, i.e. three points for a win, one for a draw, none for a loss).

Chelsea permanent managers: Points-per-game record

Set against those who have gone before him, does Potter’s dismal dozen of just four wins, four defeats and four draws in Chelsea’s most recent 12 games in all competitions qualify as a tenure-ending slump? The evidence certainly suggests as much.

Examining the final 12 games of the men above, only Mourinho had a worse end to his reign when his second spell as Chelsea manager ended with the team a point above the relegation zone, featured four wins and five defeats over the closing stretch.

Lampard and Tuchel each won five of their final 12 games, albeit with the former helped by FA Cup wins over lower-league sides Morecambe and Luton Town. Maurizio Sarri and Antonio Conte each signed off with wins in cup finals, something that feeds into the wider conversation about Chelsea and the managers they appoint.

Chelsea managers: Final 12 games in charge compared to Potter

*ongoing run

During the period in question, they won 10 major honours, including two successes apiece in the Premier League, FA Cup, Champions League and Europa League. Perhaps a culture of hire-and-fire isn’t all that bad.

It should also be remembered that this spell largely covers Roman Abramovich’s time as owner. 

Why do Chelsea sack so many managers?

Disputes over Chelsea’s current, previous and future managers tend to come back to perceptions of what sort of football operation the Stamford Bridge club are and what they might aspire to be.

For the modern Chelsea, this lurches between an emphasis on achievements and aesthetics and where that happens to land at any given moment. Do you want to win at all costs, or is how you win and the style of equal importance?

This duality can be traced back to the now well-trodden story of Abramovich deciding he wanted to buy a football club after watching Manchester United beat Real Madrid 4-3 in the second leg of a Champions League quarterfinal at Old Trafford, with the hosts going out 6-5 on aggregate after a stunning hat-trick from Brazil great Ronaldo for Los Blancos.

Abramovich was in thrall to the beautiful game but, much like Real Madrid’s continental juggernaut, he wanted to win. Claudio Ranieri did not do that in the first year after the takeover, so in came Jose Mourinho, who broke records and set new levels of excellence when winning in England.

However, it is fair to say Mourinho is not one of football’s great aesthetes. After the end of his first spell in charge early in the 2007/08 season, Chelsea were placed under Abramovich’s faithful servant Avram Grant. Then it was time for some Jogo Bonito in the form of ex-Brazil boss Luiz Felipe Scolari.

Scolari did not last a season, nor did Villas-Boas in 2011/12 — two men who, for the purpose of this framing, could be termed “project” managers. In between, Carlo Ancelotti came in as a proven winner in Italy and France and lifted the Premier League.

A third-placed finish in 2010/11 was enough for Abramovich to dispense with Ancelotti and appoint Europe’s bright young thing in Villas-Boas. It was former Chelsea midfielder Roberto Di Matteo, initially installed on an interim basis and without particular managerial credentials before or since, who delivered the trophy he craved in the Champions League.

🔵 Chelsea enjoyed the last Munich final back in 2012… #UCL | @ChelseaFC pic.twitter.com/vgHtvKmlal

— UEFA Champions League (@ChampionsLeague) September 25, 2019

Di Matteo tapped into the seductive idea of “getting” a club and having the “DNA” of a winner, while big brains like Villas-Boas were not to be trusted. The abrasive, combustible Conte came, conquered and then burned bridges. His compatriot Sarri was the next grand schemes man installed and left after a year to join Juventus with a Europa League trophy under his arm and chants of “f*** Sarriball” ringing in his ears.

The next two Chelsea bosses are a little trickier to fit into these categories, with necessity being the mother of invention when it came to the Lampard and Tuchel appointments. A transfer ban meant Stamford Bridge was not the attractive place it had once been for top coaches, with Lampard leaving Championship Derby County to take over in 2019.

Chelsea’s all-time top scorer delving into their celebrated Cobham academy meant Lampard offered a romantic break from Stamford Bridge feeling like a pragmatic place. A talented, youthful core under an old favourite gave the Frank era the feel of a project, at least until big-money signings such as Havertz and Timo Werner failed to fire and he was sacked.

In came Tuchel, with pedigree from spells at Borussia Dortmund and Paris Saint-Germain and promptly won the Champions League, playing a pragmatic 3-4-3 he had seldom used in his career. 

Tuchel was a winner, as those who chanted his name in Manchester will not hesitate to tell you, but Boehly decided he was not the man for his project.

Potter’s recent departure was arguably much less surprising with both owners and supporters likely on the same page when it came to their frustrations with his lack of results or general team improvement. 

With former Bayern Munich manager Julian Nagelsmann suddenly without a job, Chelsea likely felt the time was right to make a change in an attempt to salvage a season that could yet end with a Champions League title.