Settled Chelsea have shaken off the chaos and are on the right track under Enzo Maresca – they must now win back their place in the Champions League, writes IAN LADYMAN

Things can change quickly in football, hence the sight of a chap who won the Champions League for Chelsea just three and half years ago being booed here at Stamford Bridge. 

Kai Havertz, who scored the winner against Manchester City in Porto in the 2021 final, has the temerity to play for Arsenal now.

Here at a rather rambunctious Stamford Bridge, Havertz left the field at full-time with a huge bandage covering a head wound. It was that kind of game. Competitive, intense, lacking long spells of quality and really rather rough and tough at times.

Havertz, though, may have recognised something familiar in Chelsea, something he once knew but that their supporters may have given up for lost during the short but eventful ownership period of Clearlake Capital.

It’s been chaotic for a while at the Bridge. A churn of managers and players has been hard to follow never mind understand. But now, unexpected as it is, there is order. There is a method and – it appears – a way forward.

The German won the Champions League for Chelsea just three and half years ago

Chelsea were led then by their German coach and new England manager Thomas Tuchel

Chelsea were formidable in the Champions League that year, the last significant triumph of the Roman Abramovich era. They were a powerful and versatile side, led by their German coach and new England manager Thomas Tuchel. As we said, things change fast.

This team guided by the Italian Enzo Maresca is different. It’s younger and as such there remains a callowness about it. This team makes mistakes and will do so for a while. They did so here. 

But patterns are emerging and players are developing. Last year it was Cole Palmer and ten others being dragged along behind. Now it is not.

Only eleven games into this season, Chelsea sit joint third in the table with three other teams, including their opponents here. From this point on, Chelsea must win back their place in the Champions League. There lies the path to real relevance.

Last weekend Chelsea’s opponent was Manchester United and the result was the same. So perhaps was the feeling at the end. Good enough but some disappointment in there too. That in itself speaks of progress.

On the opening day of the season here, Chelsea played Manchester City, lost 2-0 and never looked like taking anything. 

That was the day that Maresca sat through a painful post-match press conference as he tried to explain why he had ostracised Raheem Sterling and named the controversial Enzo Fernandez as his captain. That was only two and a half months ago but in that time Maresca has turned the place upside down.

Sterling is now on loan at Arsenal – where he isn’t playing – while Fernandez was on the bench for this one. But those are only small details. 

This team guided by the Italian Enzo Maresca is different. It’s younger and as such there remains a callowness about it

This Chelsea team makes mistakes and will do so for a while. They did so here

Last year it was Cole Palmer and ten others being dragged along behind. Now it is not

The bigger picture – much more important – is that Maresca has identified his ideal Premier League eleven out of the enormous squad he inherited from Mauricio Pochettino and pretty much stuck a label on it.

The former Leicester manager’s habit of playing a completely different eleven in the league compared to the Europa Conference League and domestic cup competitions is brave in itself. 

It runs the risk of alienating players. Maresca has pushed back at the public perception of him having an A and a B team but that’s pretty much the way it is and he should not apologise for it. 

Europe’s smallest club competition, for example, means nothing to Chelsea when compared to the Premier League so why should Maresca pretend that he cares for it?

He clearly doesn’t and by being bold about his selections he has retained some freshness for the games that matter while others – for example Tottenham – are struggling to be competitive on all fronts.

Here with about five minutes to go, the excellent Chelsea midfielder Moises Caicedo looked second best as he set off towards the touchline to challenge a breaking Arsenal player. 

Caicedo got there on the slide with room to spare and tackled perfectly before springing to his feet like a lamb. The 23-year-old has, it should be noted, started every single Premier League game and only one other match, a European tie at home to Servette back in August that had to be won to ensure qualification.

It takes more than fit and fresh players to make a team tick, of course. But in the modern age it’s a luxury that helps and one that Maresca has afforded himself simply by being full and frank about his team’s priorities.

Last weekend Chelsea’s opponent was Manchester United and the result was the same. So perhaps was the feeling at the end

Maresca has identified his ideal Premier League eleven out of the enormous squad he inherited from Mauricio Pochettino

Towards the end Moises Caicedo looked second best as he set off towards the touchline to challenge a breaking Arsenal player but got there with room to spare

Arsenal could have beaten Chelsea here. They were the team pushing forward at the end. Had Leandro Trossard applied a firm touch to a William Saliba cross with the very last touch of the game the offside call made by an assistant referee on the far side would in all likelihood have been shown to be erroneous by VAR.

But all of that is okay. Arsenal are at least two years further on in their development than Chelsea. They may not have won the Premier League yet but they have two consecutive years of scrapping for a title behind them and that’s invaluable. 

Chelsea, by contrast, have some boys striving to become men. Even Palmer slips into that category at times and here – among the customary moments of gentle genius – he made some decisions that were unusually rash for him.

So what this Chelsea team and this Chelsea coach needs above all else now is some patience and of course we have been here before at this famous club.

Will Maresca get it? It is to be hoped so. He has already done more than any Chelsea manager since Tuchel to suggest he may actually have a strategic vision for the future allied to the courage to implement it whatever other people may say.

As they did at Old Trafford seven days earlier, Chelsea fell behind in this game but recovered. That’s a good sign too. For now at least, they have ditched the chaos. 

This has the makings of a grown-up football team and as he left the field with jeers in his ears and blood on his brow, somebody like Havertz would have had a quiet and grudging respect for that.