Following the shocking start of the current season under Jose Mourinho the Portuguese was relieved from his duties last week and Chelsea swiftly announced yet another former manager in the dugout in Guus Hiddink who will soon take over for the second time as interim manager at Stamford Bridge.
During his first spell in West London, between February and June 2009, the Dutchman won an impressive 73.91% of his 23 games in charge as well as the FA Cup, helping the Blues to re-group and re-discover their strength as a team after the incoherency of Phil Scolari’s reign.
In 2009, he found a club aimless of the title race and turned them into cup winners. In 2015, he will be tasked with the far more serious assignment of ultimately saving the English champions for relegation.
What should the fans at Stamford Bridge expect from the return of Abramovich’s favourite fixer?
Formation (4-3-3)
Like many managers who prefer not to talk about their methods, and instead come to be seen as a motivator rather than organiser of talent, Hiddink is often written off as a tactician. However, it is unfair to disregard his ability to get the best out of his players as if he were all but a cheerleader on the sidelines. As with some players without a fixed position, his reputation suffers due to his versatility.
To some extent, Hiddink could be considered an arch-pragmatist, but not in a negative sense. He seeks to set up his system to serve and suit his players rather than the other way round, and will put his own preferences second to the needs and make-up of the squad he finds himself assigned to, playing whatever shape allows him to deploy the strongest line-up possible. In his last stint with Chelsea, he opted for a back-to-basics 4-3-3 — the closest formation he has to a default and the one he chose to build around during his ill-fated second reign over the Netherlands. With Michael Ballack, Frank Lampard and Michael Essien, he could field a proper three-man midfield with a bit of everything back in 2009, with a forward line centred on Didier Drogba and Florent Malouda and Nicolas Anelka out wide.
Although 4-3-3 may not have been a formation that provided Mourinho with much joy since his return, at least not on-par with the merits of his 4-2-3-1 prior to Chelsea’s recent meltdown, it could again be a shape to suit what Hiddink finds waiting for him in the final weeks of 2015. Nemanja Matic, Cesc Fabregas and perhaps Ruben Loftus-Cheek would represent the best mix of abilities through the middle, though they certainly aren’t the kind of power players the Dutchman came to rely on previously in West London. Jon Obi Mikel remains from his first spell, however, and Ramires may prove useless for injecting a touch more dynamism into the mix but as ever with Hiddink, his work away from the tactics board will be where he is likely to have the biggest impact on the club’s direction.