“The day after I signed with Chelsea, I sent him a video about seeing him as a midfielder.”
After years of speculation and debate around Stamford Bridge about whether Reece James' future was in the middle of the park, it took the new Chelsea -Baas Enzo Maresca only 24 hours to start wheels last summer.
The Argentinian unveiled his conversation earlier this month, more than half a year after the fact, after the start of the engine room against Aston Villa and then FC Copenhagen, the last to show a goal to show it.
The Blues captain, still only 25, has previously filled in midfield and in the central midfield for Chelsea and has long cemented its primary place when Fit, and one of Europe's best at both full-back and wing-back.
Maresca may not be aware that this evolution has been predicted for some time. He hadn't even hired his first coaching job when James was first transformed into a midfielder halfway through his first season on loan at Wigan in 2018/19, and won both the player of the player and the club player of the year in his debut season.
“The reason we move him a bit in that season was because of how excellent he was in every position,” explained manager Paul Cook later. “So, if we had what we thought was part of the pitch that we could improve, or that was a central defense, or that Wing-Back or Central Midfield was, Reece would go in there and be our best player.”
Many players have made the movement between midfield and full-back, but James is the last in an increasing number that the opposite does. Trent Alexander-Arnold went to Euro 2024 with the NO 8 shirt, after he had played no more than a handful of games for Liverpool away from right-back but effectively working as one in-game.
James has given that something of a soft launch, even before this two-game test, with Maresca in the Guardiola-Woudd from moving a full-back in the middle of the park when his teams have the ball to help dominate the possession.
For flying full-backs built on crosses it can limit their game, and for a long time James fits that fungus well. Even after his half season in midfield with the Latics, Cook admitted that he thought that right back would eventually be his best position.
James does not have the same lightning speed now. Even six years later, almost a third of the competition in his entire career came during that spell in the championship, the injury he has confronted since then, especially in the past three seasons.
But necessity is the mother of all invention. Maybe Maresca always saw this progression back to midfield as he said, but now it is certainly the time before, even at a pure pragmatic level.
Although the Chelsea system requires a lot of its midfielders, it does not require the intensity of runs of its full-backs and it will probably turn out to be friendly on James' body.
At the technical level there is little doubt that James can do it. He has all the attributes of an astute defensive midfielder with his one-on-one defense, and even in the middle of his injury misery Man City's Jeremy Doku called him “one of the most difficult defenders I ever played against” last season.
But his reputation as an attacking full-back does not have to be lost either. In 2021/22, the last season, where he started more than half of the Premier League matches of Chelsea, he completed the eighth end-thirds of each player in the division. If he can stay fit, there is no reason why James cannot be formed in a box-to-box midfielder, something that Cook recognizes in the northwest almost ten years ago.
James looked long and rusty in the defeat of Chelsea in Aston Villa and played a rare full 90 minutes, but this seemed like a player without playing time instead of losing his touch, his concentration levels falter when he was caught twice in dangerous moments in Villa Park.
The 25-year-old himself still thinks that he has more to learn about a return to midfield and recently says: “I am reasonably used to the role and I will improve with time.” That seems like an inevitable next step as long as he can stay fit.
And there is the biggest demand on Maresca's lips. In a position where the head coach lacks depth, can he trust James to stay fit and to help offer it?
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