Chelsea will regret letting “world-class” GK leave

Chelsea’s miserable form continues.

On Saturday evening, despite taking the lead inside ten minutes through Enzo Fernández, the Blues were beaten 2-1 at Villa Park, the late winner coming in the final minute of the 90.

This means Enzo Maresca’s side have now lost three consecutive Premier League away games, winning only two of their last ten league fixtures played anywhere, so now find themselves outside the Champions League places.

As the Blues’ woes rumble on, one rather important position epitomises their struggles.

Chelsea’s goalkeeper issues

Saturday saw summer signing Filip Jorgensen start a third successive Premier League match in goal, although he won’t remember his trip to the Midlands fondly, letting Marco Asensio’s rather tame shot to squirm straight through him in the dying embers of the game.

Matt Law of the Telegraph labelled it a ‘howler’, Malik Ouzia of the Evening Standard described it as a ‘clanger [that] gifted Villa all three points’, while Maresa himself admitted he remains “always concerned” by Chelsea’s ongoing goalkeeper crisis.

That’s because, as noted by Chris Wilson of the Independent, this is not a new thing, stating that ‘Chelsea’s goalkeeping woes continue’.

Jorgensen is only donning the gloves because Robert Sanchez, who had started 21 of the first 23 Premier League matches this season, has been dropped following a string of high-profile errors.

The Spaniard was last seen in the league during the 3-1 defeat at Manchester City, in which Sanchez ‘endured a terrible performance’ in the words of GOAL, mere days after, as noted by Jacob Steinberg of the Guardian, he’d ‘added to his growing list of mistakes’ during the home win over Wolves.

Prior to the 3-0 defeat at Brighton, Maresca confirmed Jorgensen is now his starting Premier League goalkeeper at the moment, with Sanchez therefore set to feature in Conference League matches, the Blues face København at Parken in the first leg of their last 16 on Thursday week, but given how the pair are performing, this hierarchy certainly is not set in stone.

However, is Chelsea’s best goalkeeper, outperforming both Sánchez and Jörgensen, currently out on loan, a decision they’re surely living to regret as every week passes?

Chelsea’s best goalkeeper is out on loan

As noted by Nizaar Kinsella of BBC Sport, Chelsea began the season with eight first-team goalkeepers on their books, before four of them, namely Gabriel Słonina, Eddie Beach, Kepa Arrizabalaga and, most notably, Đorđe Petrović, departed on loan.

Petrović joined Chelsea for a reported fee of £14m from the New England Revolution in August 2023, having been, as Tom Bogert of the Athletic put it, ‘the best goalkeeper in Major League Soccer’.

The stats certainly back up this claim; according to FBref, the Revs’ shot-stopper racked up the highest post-shot expected goals – goals allowed figure of any goalkeeper in MLS throughout the 2022 season, his figure of +13.1 at least three higher than the next-best on this list.

Post-shot expected goals (PSxG) is a metric used to determine how likely a goalkeeper is to save a shot.

The Serbian arrived in West London to little fanfare but, by the end of last season, had established himself as Mauricio Pochettino’s first-choice, starting all 23 Premier League fixtures from ten December onwards, as well as the EFL Cup Final defeat to Liverpool.

However, surplus to requirements this season, Tom Weber of Football Transfers believes he was deemed ‘not good enough with the ball at his feet’ to play in a Maresca team, he therefore joined Strasbourg on loan in August, the other club owned by Todd Boehly’s group BlueCo.

Well, under new manager Liam Rosenior, les Bleu et Blanc are enjoying an excellent season, knocking on the door of European qualification, as outlined by Nick Hartland of Get French Football News, while Raphaël Jucobin of the Guardian notes that the 40-year-old manager has made a ‘big impression’ in the Alsace, but he’s not the only one.

Rosenior has described his goalkeeper as “world-class”, so let’s see how Petrović compares to the two misfits Chelsea decided to keep instead.

Petrovic vs Sanchez & Jorgesen 2024/25
Statistics	Petrovic	Sanchez	Jorgensen
Appearances	19	22	16
Minutes	1,710	1,980	1,440
Goals conceded	26	29	18
Goals conceded per 90	1.29	1.38	1.14
Clean sheets	5	4	5
Clean sheet %	26.3%	18.2%	31.3%
Save %	76.3%	74.8%	76.6%
Post-shot xG – goals allowed	+4.8	+0.7	-0.2
Pass completion %	79.9%	73.3%	83%
Statistics courtesy of Transfermarkt and FBref.com

As outlined in the table, it’s actually Jorgensen whose statistics are the best, very marginally in most cases, albeit these are surely inflated by the fact he’s played against minnows such as FC Noah, Astana and Shamrock Rovers in the Conference League, as well as both Barrow and Morecambe in domestic cups.

For Petrović, two statistics are most telling. First, his post-shot expected goals – goals allowed figure of +4.8 is exponentially higher than both of Chelsea’s current goalkeepers, while the Serbian ranks fourth in Ligue 1 for this metric this season.

Also, Petrović’s pass completion % figure of 79.9% is higher than Sanchez’s and only marginally lower than that of Jorgensen, dismissing the notion that he could not have played out from the back to Maresca’s required level, underlining that the Blues made a mistake forcing him to depart on loan.