“Palmer deserves better” – Chelsea transfers have failed star player says writer | OneFootball

Since being dumped by the Times, Henry Winter has started putting his thoughts on a Substack. It’s always a bit of a random wander around the weekend’s football action around the world, but this week he made a very pertinent point about Chelsea and their failings against Brighton on Saturday night.

He noted what all Blues fans have seen in worrying amounts in the last month or more: Cole Palmer looking more and more peripheral and more and more frustrated as he does everything for this team but gets little help from those around him.

That goes for the defenders not keeping clean sheets and the other attackers not helping with the goalscoring Burden. Winter put it well:

“Cole Palmer is a committed team player who gives everything for Chelsea but he could be forgiven deepening frustration for not having an elite centre-forward to work off and feed,” the top tier football scribe wrote.

“Christopher Nkunku dropped deep into Palmer’s realm in the FA Cup loss to Brighton & Hove Albion. Nicolas Jackson is still young, 23, still improving but hasn’t scored in nine games. Palmer deserves better around him.”

Chelsea miss their number 9 to help Palmer – problems run deeper than that

Nicolas Jackson celebrates scoring against Liverpool. (Photo by Darren Walsh/Chelsea FC via Getty Images)

Noting how unsuited Nkunku is as Jackson’s backup was a common theme of the weekend. Liam Twomey said Enzo Maresca’s team “had no answers” without their pressing machine up top. Craig Burley noted similar problems in his devastating roundup for ESPN.

Even then, we’re talking about a guy with no goals in 9 games. Palmer works well with him, but we’ve been struggling almost as much with Jackson in the team as without. We can’t pretend his return will fix everything – Palmer needs more help than just that.