Maurizio Sarri has found out life at Chelsea can be challenging.
Poor performances in recent months have seen patience grow thin for the Italian and supporters claim it is only a matter of time before he gets the boot.
A decade earlier, Luiz Felipe Scolari was hired by the Blues, but was soon shown the exit door.
Could Chelsea be set to experience deja vu all these years later?
The term Sarrismo is an expression used to describe the way in which Sarri has his teams play. It was coined in Italy, possession-based football; it requires players to be quick-witted, sharp, on the move, a more direct tika-taka, made famous by Barcelona under Pep Guardiola.
This got Chelsea fans excited. Fast-paced, offensive and entertaining, it was a contrast to the negative, almost reluctant style deployed by predecessor Antonio Conte and less successfully so in his second and final season.
Carefully selected clips highlighted what Sarri had to offer, his Napoli side played beautiful football, challenged for the title. Dries Mertens changed position to great effect; Gonzalo Higuain could not stop scoring.
Roman Abramovich liked what he saw, he has never made it a secret of his desire to see his club play attractive football. But this was an itch he had tried to scratch a decade earlier.
In his playing career, Scolari was a no-nonsense defender for Caxias. He was imposing, lacked any real skills and featured as a centre-back. Team-mates referred to him as ‘Perna-de-Pau, wooden leg in Brazilian Portuguese slang for bad player.
Management was his next step upon retirement in 1982, Scolari won the championship with Gremio before a two-year spell in charge of Kuwait.
By 2001, he had been appointed manager of Brazil. At the World Cup in Korea/Japan the following year, his side would win the tournament. Ronaldo, Rivaldo and Ronaldinho made up a formidable attack.
The trio were supported by the likes of Lucio, Edmilson, Cafu and Roberto Carlos. This is where Scolari’s name would become household, known beyond his homeland.
Taking charge of the Portugal national team, Scolari led Luis Figo and co to runners-up at Euro 2004. Two years later, they finished fourth at the World Cup in Germany. Scolari’s stock was at an all-time high, Chelsea had taken note and ‘Big Phil’ was tasked with sprinkling his national touch upon West London and turning the Blues into Champions of Europe.
They had just lost the final to Manchester United under Avram Grant.
The bullish approach which led him to national and league titles quickly became apparent, Scoalri was out to make his mark, stamp his authority. It was his first major club job in Europe.
In came Deco from Barcelona, Scolari knew him well from his time with Portugal. A long-range effort on his Premier League debut and a free-kick winner in the following match against Wigan appeared to justify his purchase. He was soon figured out as the season progressed.
Scolari clashed with a number of big personalities, established international players used to getting their own way. Michael Ballack, Didier Drogba, Nicolas Anelka, to name a few who had issues with the blunt approach of the new manager.
In the case of Drogba, Scolari wanted Adriano from Inter Milan. A deal fell through and the Ivorian took this personally.
Anelka was unwilling to play on the left; he had been scoring regularly at the beginning of the season. His lack of discipline and selflessness infuriated Scoalri. The Frenchman was blamed years later for his sacking.
This was not the case for everyone at Chelsea.
“I enjoyed Scolari and [Carlo] Ancelotti – they’re probably my favourite two,” Ashley Cole told Monday Night Football when asked who his favourite manager to player under was.
“Scolari came at a time where I probably wasn’t playing as well as I knew I could when I first came to Chelsea, and the fans will agree with me that I wasn’t the Ashley Cole they knew at Arsenal.
“He came and brought this new lease of life, it was just like playing for Brazil.”
Chelsea begun the 2008/09 season strongly, the first league loss came nine matches in, 1-0 at home to Liverpool. It ended a 86-game unbeaten run at Stamford Bridge.
At the end of January 2009, patience had already begun to wear thin with Scolari. Chelsea had drawn with Fulham, they were then beaten, comprehensively 3-0 by Manchester United and needed a goal in the third minute of stoppage time from Frank Lampard to beat Stoke. A 2-0 loss to Liverpool was followed by a 0-0 draw at home to Hull. Scolari was sacked, dismissed after just seven months.
Ten years on, the situation is eerily similar. Like Scolari, Sarri was acknowledged for the flair and how his teams played, the way Abramovich craved. Unlike Scolari however, the 60-year-old has spent two decades managing in Italy and has no trophies to show for it.
Jorginho, like Deco under Scolari, was recruited by Sarri. A familiar face, one who knew his demands from their time together at Napoli, he was the man in which Chelsea would be built around.
For the first few games it worked. Quick passing, mostly sideways or one-touch, took Jorginho to the top of the statistics lists for passing. No assists but this mattered little in the initial stages as Chelsea kept winning, keeping pace with Liverpool and Manchester City.
The midfielder was soon found out, Tottenham laid the blueprint, other teams soon took note and followed suit. Swarming him and isolating Eden Hazard. It is as simple as that.
Gary Cahill, N’Golo Kante, Cesc Fabregas, Ruben Loftus-Cheek were among those who have found life hard under Sarri.
Cahill, the heartbeat of Chelsea’s defence in recent seasons, a hero in the 2012 Champions League final, now restricted to cup competitions and sometimes not even in the squad.
Kante, the defensive protector, who has been one of the club’s best players, moved out of position to accommodate Jorginho, then publicly criticised as not being technically good enough to play in the role he has made his own since joining Leicester in 2015.
Sarri, as did Scolari, made an impressive start to life in England. He set a Premier League record for longest unbeaten run of a new manager, 12 games. But the wheels fell off suddenly and emphatically the following game, 3-1 to Spurs. Defeats to Wolves, Leicester, Arsenal and a humiliating 4-0 thumping at Bournemouth mean ‘Sarri-ball’ is merely a slogan, a so-far failed experiment.
A fine coach Scoalri was, he was unable to adapt, believed the system should be the same always, Sarri too has the same philosophy, his stubbornness means refusal to change, adjust accordingly to the circumstances.
The parallels with this season and Scolari’s brief spell cannot be ignored. In fact, Scolari has a similar record to Sarri at the point he was fired. He had only lost five times in 36 matches. Sarri is now on seven from 39 matches.
Patience is not a virtue in modern football, especially at Chelsea.
They are 12 points off of Manchester City and there is no guarantee of dining at Europe’s top table next season.
A 5-0 win over Huddersfield has momentarily kept reality at bay. Sarri will need to improve results if history is to avoid repeating itself.