Chelsea fire sale: Antonio Conte right to sell these five in January?
5. Oscar
Oscar is another player who is a victim of Antonio Conte’s failed midfield. It’s not solely the individual players that are at fault. It’s these players, in this formation, playing this style. That’s the problem. Given that, they can probably all leave.
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Oscar is a talented player, however, who is not afraid of hard work. He’s never really developed into the player everybody hoped he would, but he’s still an asset to the team. Just don’t play him in central midfield.
He works hard and can link the midfield together well. He just lacks that end product that you would think his talent would produce. Oscar is the type of player you watch and then come away thinking how good he is. Only to later realize that he rarely produces more than two or three assists in a season.
For a number 10, that’s nowhere near enough. Goals do come along in an Oscar season, but not enough to say he’s a goal-scoring number 10, rather than a creative one. Fabregas is much more productive when in the right team, but just doesn’t offer the same work rate.
It’s apples and oranges in the end, really. But Antonio Conte’s whole midfield is like that. It’s a fruit bowl being used as a gold fish bowl. Everybody knows what’s supposed to be happening but he’s got the wrong equipment for the job he wants to do.
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Still, Oscar has enough about him to stick around beyond January. If not in central midfield, then in a wide position or as a number 10 in a new formation. Something has to change at Chelsea. Oscar leaving the club is not necessarily it.