Chelsea defenders must be ready for the endless 1-on-1 with Wilfried Zaha

Maurizio Sarri acknowledged the controversy of his defense last weekend against Burnley and Derby. Chelsea focuses on Wilfried Zaha's one of the most challenging individual challenges.

At the team level, Chelsea does not have to worry about Crystal Palace. The palace in the Premier League for the third lowest goal (seven). Even this figure was somewhat inflated, as two of these goals came from crunching kicks in their struggle against Arsenal. Blues must be intelligent and competent against Eagles, but they do not need a particularly strict defense plan.

With one exception. Chelsea needs a plan that deals with Wilfried Zaha.

Zaha is similar to this season as Chelsea strikers. He does a lot of good things, but he does not sell the finished product. Zaha is Eden Hazard's runner-up for the successful dribbles this season, 43-9 games. He pays the same price as Hazard: Zaha runs the championship because of the fouls he faces (Hazard nearly one second). Zaha is second in the Crystal Palace for key passages and uses about one-fifth of all of the Palace's shots.

Although Hazard has seven goals and three assistants, Wilfried Zaha has only scored three goals and helped another. He let it go, that means that he created more than half of the palace goals. But your creative efforts suggest much higher results.

The dam could explode at any time, even if the team was around. Zaha's talent is deeply unique. Like Hazard, you can create moments or campaigns that increase the level of people around you and subtract your team from temporary (or longer term) scares.

So while Chelsea does not have to worry about defending Crystal Palace against XI-vs-XI, they really need to fight Wilfried Zaha. Antonio Rudiger and Cesar Azpilicueta are particularly responsible for handling them.

Azpilicueta is one of the few full backs that can step on Zaha and do not give up bad irregularities or reservations, and do not let the booty easily and protect the space behind it. Azpilicueta can give Zaha a frank daily nomination that Zaha will appreciate as it is increasingly needed and Crystal Palacera to talk about how little protection she has from officials. Nevertheless, Azpilicueta was exposed for most of the season. Positioning and tactical reading are definitely not typical.

Rudiger has to pay particular attention to Azpilicueta's back. If Zaha reaches Azpilicueta, he falls into Rudiger to know if he should come and meet Zaha or have a central role to play to ensure that nobody opens a free header.

Considering how much Chelsea possesses, Rudiger can not count on David Luiz insisting on him, and what is the word? – defense. Given that the back line shifted during the long-term possession period, Rudiger and Azpiliceuta are probably the deepest Blues for most games. If the Crystal Palace counter, the best Luiz, hoped to retire from the palace's penalty area, cut out the late passes. But at this point Zaha had beaten – or at least threatened – Kepa Arrizabalaga.

When Crystal Palace maintains its hold on the Chelsea area, a typical instantaneous departure from Luiz can create Zaha's place to stumble; for another step forward to cut off the cross; or Patrick van Aanholt or Luka Milivojevic, to shoot the shot from the top of the box.

Since Marcos Alonso and Nero Golo Kante joined the offense and David Luiz worked with Luiz, Wilfried Zaha found a lot of seams on Chelsea midfield and defensive. He also saw many mature goals to participate in seasoning seasonal statistics.

Maurizio Sarri will need his defenders to preserve all their protective bases that protect Wilfried Zaha's neutrality. Although they can get the most, but not all, their attention is because they have the opportunity to play. Crystal Palace is no longer an old-fashioned team, but Zaha could do more than enough for himself.