Having sat and squirmed through every one of his missed chances for Chelsea, I know precisely what Timo Werner will be going through. First thing in the morning, middle of the day, last thing at night, the same thought will be jabbing at his brain: “Where is my next goal coming from?”
He’ll be praying for one to go in off his arse, for that little fluke, anything to have that feeling again. When you lose it, nothing is worse.
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In those 11 games in all competitions since his last goal, you can see Werner’s desperation fester and grow to the point where if you’d been watching him play for the first time recently you’d assume he was just terrible at finishing.
His record for Germany and RB Leipzig tells you otherwise, but we’re talking about a player whose confidence is zero — it’s shattered and battered — and he’s got no belief in his ability to put the ball in the back of the net.
What’s interesting is just how that lack of confidence can wheedle its way into your body, how it can affect your balance and technique and body shape, creating a classic vicious circle and I think my own experience is worth mentioning here, if only because I played the same position and went through the same thing. There’s no easy way out of it — just a retreat to the training ground — but I’ll come back to that.
My career burst into life when I scored a hat-trick against Arsenal on my full debut for Southampton. I was 17 and being eased into the first team, but what happened next was a bit less newsworthy; no more goals for the remainder of that season and none at all the following campaign. I can remember it vividly; “Jesus Christ, I can’t score for toffee.” It was incredibly frustrating.
Later, there were two years without scoring in an England shirt. I was still banging in goals for Blackburn Rovers at that point which made it slightly easier, I suppose, although I was reporting for international duty thinking to myself, “Is this ever going to change?” Thankfully, it did when it mattered and Euro ’96 came along, but that sensation was truly horrible. You question everything.
Your technique can desert you, 100 per cent. It’s the same with golf; when you’re playing well, you don’t even think about the four-foot putt or when you line up for a drive on the first tee. You just hit it. When form goes, your whole technique can go. You over-think it, you over-analyse and compensate. Nothing comes naturally any more. Everything becomes difficult when you’re going through a barren spell.
That’s exactly where Werner finds himself now, as the following examples illustrate. Until I sat down and analysed his misses, I hadn’t appreciated just how bad some of his finishing has been.
Chelsea 1-1 Aston Villa, December 28
This isn’t a great opportunity — there are plenty of bodies in front of him — but it’s a great demonstration of how the basics can be lost. Werner came off the substitutes’ bench in the 72nd minute and, if anything, that puts greater pressure on him to make a difference and get it right. It’s not his fault that Chelsea paid £47.5 million for him, but there is a responsibility and expectation that comes with it.
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Werner is leaning back as he shoots and that’s something you’re told repeatedly to avoid as a kid; lean back and it goes sky high, get over the ball and it stays low. As I say, it’s not an easy chance, but he looks so desperate to get his shot away that it’s clouding his judgment and affecting his technique. He makes a right hash of it. And, sure enough, sky-high it goes.
Arsenal 3-1 Chelsea, December 26
I’ve frozen this just before Werner hits the ball and it’s a model of desperation. I’d never criticise anybody for wanting to get a shot away — that instinct is fine — but look at his stance; it’s desperation to help his team, impress his manager.
He’s actually a yard ahead of the ball, so he’s having to adjust everything. There’s no way he makes a good connection because of his body position and the outcome — a weak shot that dribbles wide — is inevitable.
Chelsea 3-0 West Ham, December 21
This is a game of bad touches and faulty thinking and how that can make life infinitely more difficult for strikers. Look at the position where Werner receives the ball for the first chance. Look at how much space he has and at the size of the gap to the goalkeeper’s right. For me, a striker who is among the goals and full of confidence doesn’t even think about taking a touch there. He hits it first time.
Werner is not that striker, though, and everything falls apart from there. Instead, he takes it with the outside of his right boot, his body is in the wrong position to do it and his touch is poor. The ball is now right under his feet, so he has to adjust himself again, which means another touch and because of that, the keeper is bigger and covering far more of the goal. He is now the one in control. Werner is stumbling over it, off balance, having to sort his feet out.
His second chance from that game tells a similar tale, although I think that Werner was within his rights to take a touch here because the weight of the pass dictates it. The extraordinary thing is the contrast between where he receives the ball and where he ends up shooting from. He goes from a brilliant position, where he has the entire goal to aim at, to a difficult one, where his angle has been cut off. His probability of scoring plummets.
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Again, this is purely about how confidence can impinge upon technique, but it’s an absolutely awful, rotten touch, which sees the ball travel eight or nine yards. The one positive is that he’s still getting into these positions.
The old cliche is right; the time to worry is when you’re not getting chances, although it’s easy for me to say that when I’m out of the game. It probably doesn’t pacify you when you’re playing and being bombarded with advice.
Wolverhampton Wanderers 2 -1 Chelsea, December 15
Another big lean backwards. What’s curious about this clip is that when you watch it at full pace, Werner does not need to stretch this much. It’s not as if he falls over afterwards. He’s done the hard work by getting into the box, but he actually slows down and checks his run, extending his stride.
The ball is on the half-volley, but it’s the middle of the goal, 12 yards out and he’s making it far more difficult for himself. He’s stretching, leaning back, all over the place.
Chelsea 3-1 Leeds, December 5
I’m really not sure what to say about this apart from, “Fucking hell”. If ever you wanted or needed a tap-in… The ball has been hit to the far post from a corner, it’s pretty much on the line and somehow it goes backwards. He’s stretching and he’s trying to tap it in with his studs, which is fair enough, but he just gets it all wrong. It’s a sitter.
From later in the same game… again, it’s that extra touch. It’s a great pass from Olivier Giroud but Werner’s first touch is terrible again and because it’s so bad, it means another one.
If the first touch was towards the goal or even slightly to his right, the defender doesn’t get near him, but the second takes him wide which means he’s reducing his angle all the time and having to come around the ball. The keeper makes a decent save, but he had time to set himself.
Later still, there was another chance when Werner is running onto the ball in the box. I think he could have got there quicker, he shortens his stride and takes too many steps. He’s waiting, waiting and waiting and thinking about it. It should be: go on, get onto it, stick it into the net.
Rennes 1-2 Chelsea, November 24
Unbelievable. If you play through the build-up, his body is just contorted, he’s tying himself up in knots as the ball gets to him and he checks twice to get around it. There are one, two extra steps; it’s as if his feet are working at a different speed to the rest of him.
It’s fine to open himself up — it’s right to do that — but it’s how he does it which is particularly weird and awkward.
Chelsea 4-1 Sheffield United, November 7
At this stage, Werner is coming to the end of a run of 11 goals in 12 games for club and country and it was the last time he scored for Chelsea. It’s worth including because it’s a great example of someone who isn’t thinking about anything. He doesn’t look, he doesn’t check his run, his technique is all right, his balance is there, he doesn’t have to touch the ball or push away from goal.
The only thing that will happen here is that Werner will score.
So the big question is how he gets back there. He can’t knock on the manager’s door and say he should be starting matches, because when you look at the chances he’s missing, he doesn’t deserve to. History suggests it’s not going to last and it can’t do, both for his sake and Frank Lampard’s sake. It has to change.
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If I was Werner, I would be straining for the ball every time Chelsea are awarded a penalty. It’s such a great opportunity to get up and running again. You’d be amazed what it does to you, that feeling of seeing the ball hit the net. You grow two feet taller instantly.
On the training pitch, I’d be doubling down on work. I would get someone to knock balls into me from little angles, just behind the goal. I’d stand five or six yards out and just roll shots into an empty net. Maybe that sounds simplistic, but I’d do it time and time again, just to build my confidence up. Then I’d bring in a keeper — a first-teamer wouldn’t do it, so I’d rope in someone from the youth team — and do the same thing.
It’s about repetition, repetition, repetition. “Practice makes permanent,” as Sir Bobby Robson, my old manager at Newcastle United, used to say. The next time the ball comes to you in a match, that repetition kicks in.
(Top graphic: Sam Richardson/The Athletic)