the times | Tuesday October 20 2020 2GM 67
Sport
Chelsea’s defensive failings are under-
mining the whole team, according to
their captain César Azpilicueta, who
says that they must temper their desire
to play “beautiful football” with a more
pragmatic approach.
Frank Lampard’s side drew 3-3
against Southampton on Saturday, and
while only Manchester City and Liver-
pool have scored more Premier League
goals than Chelsea since the start of
We must be pragmatic to make up for defensive frailty, says Azpilicueta
2020, their tally of 35 conceded is only
two off the highest total in the division.
“When we are on the pitch we have to
make better decisions,” Azpilicueta said
on the eve of his team’s opening
Champions League game against
Seville. “If you’re 3-2 up you do not
expect to play the best football of your
life. You dig in, lock the door to the
finish.”
Saturday’s draw was the 11th time in
their past 23 Premier League games
that Chelsea had conceded more thantinue with the double pivot of Jorginho
and N’Golo Kanté, who have started
the past two games in midfield, or recall
Mateo Kovacic.against Seville, last season’s Europa
League winners, if Édouard Mendy has
not fully shaken off a thigh injury.
Chelsea’s most recent Champions
League tie was a 7-1 aggregate loss to
Bayern Munich in last season’s round of
16 and Lampard said he expected his
team to have absorbed the lessons of
that experience.
“Bayern was a great marker for the
young players in the squad about the
level that needs to be attained,” he said.
Lampard must decide whether to con-one goal, and Azpilicueta admitted that
the team were drained.
“When you have solidity defensively
it gives confidence to the whole team,”
he said. “When you are weak defensive-
ly you feel you have to score three or
four goals each game. I always see
football as a collective. We have to
improve.”
The match against Southampton fea-
tured another unconvincing perform-
ance from the goalkeeper Kepa Arriza-
balaga, but he could be in goal tonightJames Gheerbrant
Possible teams
Chelsea (4-2-3-1): K Arrizabalaga —
C Azpilicueta, T Silva, B Chilwell — N Kanté,
Jorginho — C Pulisic, K Havertz, M Mount —
T Werner.
Seville (4-3-3): Bono — J Navas, S Gómez,
D Carlos, M Acuña — I Rakitic, Fernando,
J Jordán — L Ocampos, L De Jong, Suso.
Referee Davide Massa (It).F
or a man who has spent the
past four days on a 125-
kilometre trek, Monchi looks
remarkably fresh-faced and
energetic.
The eyes of Seville’s famous
sporting director lit up last
Thursday when he started
explaining why the northwest of
Spain had been the holiday
destination of choice for him, his
son and five friends that week.
“I have been doing El Camino de
Santiago, which is an experience that
I would recommend to everyone,” the
thick-bearded Spaniard, 52, says of
the long walk through Galicia that
ends at the cathedral of Santiago de
Compostela.
“We increased the distance every
day. First day we walked 25km, then
28km, then 30km, and yesterday we
walked 42km. It is the third time I
have done it. I really enjoyed it.
Walking helps me think, reset,
recharge the batteries and get ready
for what lies ahead.”
Monchi, whose full name is Ramón
Rodríguez Verdejo, is one of those
admirable people who wants to
squeeze every last drop out of life.
Not one minute of his time is wasted.
During the final stages of his
11-year goalkeeping career
with Seville, Monchi
studied for a law degree.
He scoffs at the
suggestion that this is
something of an
extraordinary
achievement given the
demands of a
professional playing
career.
“Look, if you decide to do
something and you are
motivated, there is always enough
time,” he says.
Six years ago,
his desire to
broaden his
horizons took
him to London,
where he spent
six months
learning English.
In the mornings
he studied at a
school in Waterloo.
In the afternoons
he returned to his
day job of
running one of
the most
successful‘The Messi of recruitment’ –
the man behind Seville’s rise
recruitment departments in European
football. Monchi was born on
September 20, 1968, in San Fernando,
a town on Spain’s south coast which is
just over an hour away from Seville.
He came through Seville’s academy
and played in 85 league games for the
first team, who spent much of their
time yo-yoing between Spain’s top
two divisions.
In 2000, a year after Monchi retired
from playing at the age of 30 because
of a hip injury, Roberto Alés, the
president at the time, offered him the
post of sporting director.
“I got this job by coincidence,” he
says with a smile. “I have a lot of
flaws, and one of them is that I don’t
know how to say no so I said yes and
here I am 20 years later.”
In the century that
preceded Monchi’s
appointment, Seville
won four major
trophies, the last of
which was the 1947-48
Copa del Rey. In the
two decades since he
took charge of
recruitment, they have
won the Copa del Rey
twice, one European Super
Cup, one Spanish Super Cup and a
record six Europa League titles, the
most recent of which came in August
after they beat Manchester United in
the semi-final and Inter Milan in the
final.
Monchi is keen to play down his
importance in Seville’s rise. Another
of his flaws, he claims, is that he is
“not a good negotiator”.
José Castro, the Seville
president, disagrees. “He is
our Messi — there’s one
Messi on the pitch and
we have another Messi
in terms of bringing
players to the pitch,”
says Castro.
Monchi’s successes
in the transfer market
are many in number.
Ivan Rakitic: bought for
£2 million, sold to Barcelona
for £16 million. Júlio Baptista:
signed from Sao Paulo for
£1.75 million, sold to Real Madrid
for £16.9 million.
Seville made £70 million from
youth products Jesús Navas,
Sergio Ramos and José
Antonio Reyes, and the
latter two left in 2005
and 2004 respectively.
After helping Seville
to win five trophies,
Dani Alves joined
Barcelona in 2008 for
£30 million.Seville had signed Alves from Bahia
six years earlier for £500,000.
“It’s difficult to choose which signing
is my favourite because each one of
them is like your own child, and when
you are asked who is your favourite
child, you can never answer that,”
Monchi says. “But if there was one
perfect transfer it has to be Dani
because he was an unknown player,
he adapted well and won trophies. It
all went to plan.”
Seville, who begin their Champions
League campaign against Chelsea at
Stamford Bridge tonight, keep
unearthing these gems as a
consequence of fastidious planning.
The process is split into two parts:
seguimiento en bruto (gross tracking),
which takes place from July to
January, and seguimiento en
neto (net tracking), which
occurs in the six months
that follow.
In the gross-tracking
stage, the club’s 12
scouts pour reports and
information into a vast
database after scouting
the top European
countries as well as the
lesser-known leagues, such as
in Peru, Chile and Poland.
From January onwards, those
players are whittled down to a select
few per position. Monchi does not
know which positions the manager
Julen Lopetegui wants to strengthen
until he speaks to him for the first
time about targets in April.
By that point he has several
recommendations per position and he
has made calls to coaches, agents and
journalists to get a better
understanding of their personality.
“I first became aware of Seville’s
interest in me last year, but Monchi
said that he had already been
following me for another couple of
years,” said the Dutch striker Luuk de
Jong, who joined from PSV
Eindhoven in 2019 and scored the
winner against United. “He has a big
database. He knew I could hold the
ball up and he knew I was a leader.”
Three weeks ago Monchi had a
tattoo of the Europa League trophy
drawn on his left arm, with six stars
underneath to represent the number
of times the club have won the
tournament. “I promised my daughter
Maria that if we won the Europa
League, I would get a tattoo, and
when you make a promise to your
daughter, you have to fulfil it,” he says
in a rather embarrassed tone.
Given Seville’s cup pedigree, it
would come as no surprise if they
managed to go deep into the
Champions League.
“If you get out of the group stages,
then you can start to dream,” Monchi
says. “But if we win something this
season, there will be no more tattoos.
I’ve told Maria that.”Former goalkeeper
Monchi oversees a
meticulous scouting
programme in Seville,
writes Paul Hirst
Chelsea v
Seville
Champions League,
group E. Tonight, 8pm.TV: Live on BT Sport 3
from 7.15pmMonchi with the Europa
League trophy in August.
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three goals in seven
games this season but
Rashford, who has 25
goals and 11 assists since
the beginning of last
season and struck the
penalty to knock out
PSG in 2019, can hurt
Thomas Tuchel’s side on
the counter if the right
back Florenzi is caught
up field too often.opposition creativity. In
2017, he man-marked
Eden Hazard out of
Manchester United’s 2-0
victory against Chelsea,
and he can do the same
to Fernandes for PSG
tonight.3
Alessandro Florenzi
v Marcus Rashford
PSG have conceded justthough, and he can
nullify the Brazilian in
one-on-one situations.
2
Ander Herrera v
Bruno FernandesFernandes has more
Premier League goal
involvements (20) than
any player since his
debut, but Herrera has a
history of shutting down
1,279
Metres Neymar ran
with the ball in last
season’s Champions
League — more than
any player in the
competition1
Manchester United
have won one of
their six group-stage
games in France,
drawing three and
losing two2004
The last time PSG
lost at home in the
Champions League
group stages,suffering a 3-1 defeat
by CSKA Moscow
Wan-Bissaka