Daniele de Rossi has long been speculated with a move to Chelsea. The AS Roma player is primarily employed in the defensive midfielder role, which happens to be a position that has come under question for the Blues. However, many have forgotten that there is another transfer target in Jose Mourinho’s mind - the vastly underrated Sami Khedira. The German international burst into the international scene after playing an integral role in Germany’s run to the semi-final in the 2010 World Cup. He was bought by Real Madrid in 2010 for an undisclosed fee from Vfb Stuttgart. Since then, he has often been deployed alongside Xabi Alonso forming an effective midfield duo on the field; it allows Alonso being the more attack-minded midfielder while Khedira is the enforcer dominating the middle of the pitch with his physical build. Daniele de Rossi is seen as the perfect player for Chelsea’s pivot but I would like to see Khedira been given a shot too. If we talk about age, then Khedira wins as he is only 26 years old now while de Rossi is already 30. Bringing in the latter would equal to purchasing a player who is at his peak or almost past it but has a lot of experience while getting in the former would provide us an energetic player who is just about entering his peak. Khedira’s importance to the current Real Madrid squad has been vastly under-rated. Carlo Ancelotti doesn’t seem to have the German in his plans, to which the fans of Los Blancos have no problem with as for them, his departure is nothing to be worried or bothered about. Moreover, many will prefer new signing - Asier Illarramendi - who is much more suited to the passing style of play Ancelotti is trying to implement at Madrid. Khedira has often been described as a team player with German national team manager - Joachim Low - himself saying that Khedira would put others before himself, which makes him a key player in the middle of the park. A prime example of his influence was in the Champions League group stage against last season’s finalist Borussia Dortmund at Signal Iduna Park. He was taken off injured in the 20th minute which resulted in his side losing control of the game as they were unable to hold onto the ball and create chance. Madrid eventually went on to lose 2-1. The role of a defensive midfielder is often underrated and I don’t really want to spark that debate now but the important thing is, Khedira will easily enter into a list of top 10 defensive midfielders in the world. For Chelsea, we need someone who will fit into the pivot and act as a holding midfielder. We need someone who can play an active role in ensuring a smooth transition from defence to attack while his partner can join the attack. Prime example between Mikel and Khedira is that. The German doesn’t slow the play down, which has been a constant problem about Mikel. Moreover, Khedira provides an attacking threat too as he loves to get forward and have a pop at goal. Now, let’s look at the statistics. I have chosen 7 players who can play in the pivot for Chelsea, from which 5 are already in the team and the other two are Khedira and de Rossi. If we look at the goals scored, then Lampard obviously stands out for simple reasons. He is probably the most attack minded pivot player on the planet. When we look at number of appearances, Ramires has been used the most and he did have quite a good season last season in the Premier League. Moving on to passing accuracy, we can clearly see Mikel blasts away any kind of opposition. With a passing accuracy of 89%, very defensive midfielders would come close in comparison to him. Khedira has about 81% while de Rossi’s is only slightly better with 84% Now let’s move on to the stats that people would like to compare for midfielders. Khedira gets forward a lot and this is largely due to the outstanding relationship he has with Alonso, with both players knowing when the other gets forward and the other stays back. He has an average shot of 59% for a reason and it comes as a bigger surprise to see Lampard come in second with 58% while de Rossi comes in at only 17%. Let’s also try to ignore the that Mikel has an accuracy of 0% as you actually need to take a shot to even be considered. The total chances created bring even more surprises. The Premier League might be a very physical and fast paced league but the Bundesliga is not far behind and this is illustrated with Kevin de Bruyne created 85 chances for Werder Bremen last season. The average duels won is a sum of fouls committed, successful take-ons and success in aerial battle. Lampard wins the aspect with 62%, mostly due to his smart thinking on the pitch with de Rossi having a 58% success rate which has helped AS Roma in having a firm control of midfield and Ramires stands at 59% because of his pace and the fact that he is constantly brought down by opponents. Now play time is over and we can be honest here. Statistics will always give only half of the story. Javier Hernandez has more international goals than Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi but that does not mean that one is better than the other. It does, however, expand one’s knowledge. Getting back to the main point, I will be more in favour of bringing in Khedira as this gives an option for the future including providing the Chelsea midfield with a much needed depth. However if the question arises asking whether do we need another defensive midfielder, then the answer is an outright no! Having Essien, Ramires, Lampard, de Bruyne, Mikel and van Ginkel are enough to be honest. I would rather like to see one of the youth players being promoted rather than bringing in another midfielder. NOTE : I have left out van Ginkel from the statistics because his exploits in the Dutch league could not be found clearly.
