Gianfranco Zola has sympathy for Mauricio Pochettino (Photo by Jonathan Moscrop/Getty Images)
Chelsea legend Gianfranco Zola says the club have a major ‘problem’ as the pressure mounts on Mauricio Pochettino.
The Blues have made a poor start to the campaign, collecting just five points from their opening six fixtures.
Pochettino oversaw around £400m of spending last summer, which took the club’s spending under Todd Boehly to around £1.1bn.
But the outlay has had little effect on Chelsea’s decline, and the Blues face a gruelling run of fixtures where they take on the majority of the top six in the next two months.
But Zola says it’s the spending that has caused the biggest ‘problem’ at Chelsea, as supporters have no infinity with the new wave of players.
‘Pochettino has just one league win this term (Photo by Mike Stobe/Getty Images)’Pochettino has just one league win this term (Photo by Mike Stobe/Getty Images)
‘The supporters don’t identify with these players yet,’ Zola told the Times.
‘There are a lot of new players, young ones, and they are not fulfilling the expectations of the supporters and that is creating, let’s say dissatisfaction.
‘When you invest so much money and you bring in so many new players the risk is you don’t form a group because it’s difficult. The players have to create a bond. It takes time.
‘I hope the supporters understand the expectation level can’t be like it was four or five years ago. This is not the same team now. This team is forming itself. That’s the problem at the moment.’
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