“I am not a fan” – Enzo Maresca scorns “up and down” Chilwell as a road runner, but praises James | OneFootball

Reece James returned to action on Saturday with a 45 minute appearance, and should be fit for more minutes in tomorrow night’s game.

Enzo Maresca spoke in an interesting way in today’s press conference about how he saw James fitting in for the rest of the season. What he wants is players in those positions who come inside and play in the midfield, not just overlap and huge the touchline.

Asked whether the way he asks his full backs to play actually could help James and his long standing injury issues, the manager agreed his more conservative deployment could help:

“For sure, full-backs using in that way, up and down, it is probably using more energy for them. I am not a fan of a full-back up and down. The full-backs that we use, we don’t use them up and down. The only game we did was the Palace one. I am not a fan of full-backs up and down.

He can play everywhere. Reece is playing in four or five different positions. Talk about position, for me, football today you have to be a football player and play in different positions.”

Maresca’s mind made up on “up and down” Chilwell

Ben Chilwell warms up in the Carabao Cup. (Photo by Mike Hewitt/Getty Images)

Maresca also took the chance to compare James’ success in adapting to his system to fellow full back Ben Chilwell, who hasn’t had a sniff all season:

“I can see Malo Gusto or Reece James or Cucurella doing a different kind of job in the game. I think Chilwell is a top full-back doing that job up and down but I struggle to see Ben doing different kind of things.”

So there you have it. Maresca thinks James is good enough to “up and down” or to invert and play more centrally in the way the manager likes it. While he rather scornfully Chilwell is only qualified to do the running up and down.