The expensive summer signing of Chelsea, Timo Werner, is currently struggling badly at the club. What is wrong with him, the former best striker of RB Leipzig?
Arguably, it is hard to explain why Timo Werner is struggling at Chelsea right now. His style of football does not seem to change that much. Moving in a wide range and then tap in a chance from a cross or a through ball, that style of football is what Timo Werner has been doing since he was in VFB Stuttgart youth academy.
Nothing changed even when he moved to RB Leipzig later on. Perhaps, only one thing was different. His position during his time with Stuttgart academy used to be in the wing side where he could use his pace advantage and create a nightmarish night for the defenders.
But when he moved to RB Leipzig, he turned himself into a center forward and solely played in this position since then.
His outcome as a center forward actually was better than himself as a winger. He scored 14 goals and assisted 6 times after playing a total of 103 matches for Stuttgart as wingers. While Werner scored 95 times after a total of 159 games for RB Leipzig. Such an incredible outcome as a center forward of Werner convinced Chelsea to pay such a huge price tag for Werner.
Werner started off with fierce form at Chelsea, scoring in his debuts and showing such a potential future. Ironically, Werner recently is being put in the wing once again, and consequently, his outcome is kind of poor. Eight goals after 21 matches is not that bad at all, but for a superstar that possess a price tag of nearly 70 million euros, it is not the wanted outcome.
It makes sense that good pace of Werner can help him fulfill a wide position of the wing, but as a center forward, the German striker turned out to be more comfortable.
He rather to move in a wide range and then cut inside to tap in a good pass from behind. It is not what Werner winger can do. As a winger, Werner is not the target man of every single passes from the midfield, instead of, he has to create chances for Tammy Abraham and Olivier Giroud who are the center forwards of Frank Lampard.
Abraham and Giroud are hard to be replaced as they are showing good form of scoring goal and being good target men that Frank Lampard loves using.
It is not to say that Werner is not a good target man. He could potentially be a target man, but the German rather implements himself more as a second striker. He moves wide, choose a time to move into the box, and then tap in a shot. Lampard has an idea of using Werner as a second striker, but instead of putting him in the center, the English coach put his German player in the wing side hoping that Werner can duplicate what he has done in the shirt of RB Leipzig.
Unfortunately, English soccer is nothing alike to German.
In the previous total of 8 matchers, Werner has not scored a single goal for Chelsea.
Lampard is convinced that a goal can help Werner break the goal’s drought.
“That’s the period Timo is in, it’s unfortunate but he’s getting in the positions – when one (goal) goes in it will be a run for him,” Lampard told the BBC. That belief is encouraging, but could it help Werner overcome the bad streak? There is no answer for that concern yet.
Perhaps, Werner is still adapting himself with new role on the field. It is a struggling process that the German striker has been through, and so far, he still needs to work hard on it. So far, we have not known yet what happened to Werner.