Chelsea should let want-away Maurizio Sarri go despite Europa League victory

Italian manager and Premier League club has felt a marriage of inconvenience for months

Maurizio Sarri led Chelsea to Europa League victory, which proved to be his first major trophy as a manager. Shaun Botterill / Getty Images

It was a moment when, suddenly, many could empathise with the most misunderstood man in English football.

Maurizio Sarri stood on the pitch in Baku, looking at his Europa League medal in a mixture of disbelief and wonder. His version of a mid-life crisis had been to quit his job as a banker to become a manager. He had won his first trophy; at his 19th club, 29 years after the initial move into coaching. Sarri had worked his way up from Italy’s eighth tier.

At 60, he had vindication for his unorthodox career choices.

Wednesday’s events led many to conflate various things. An achievement worth celebrating does not necessarily make Sarri a manager worth keeping. Not if Chelsea, who have paid some £90 million (Dh417.5m) in compensation to dismissed coaches in the past 15 years, can bank £5m.

And not if Sarri prefers to cap his rise from obscurity by becoming the outsider who takes charge of Italy's most decorated and celebrated club, Juventus. He has told Chelsea he wants to talk to them. They will let him.

Sarri and Chelsea has felt a marriage of inconvenience for months. With silverware, with appearances in two finals, with a third-place finish in the Premier League, he can leave as a qualified success and not the failure he felt in winter when successive away games brought a 4-0 thrashing at Bournemouth and a 6-0 walloping by Manchester City.

Perhaps Sarri's innate stubbornness helped him survive that traumatic spell, Kepa Arrizabalaga's display of dissent in the League Cup final and the evidence he lacked authority. Instead, Sarri achieved twin objectives.

And yet, as Juventus’ treatment of Massimiliano Allegri indicates, past feats are no guarantee of continued employment. Allegri was dismissed after winning five successive Serie A titles.

Sarri’s time at Stamford Bridge has been shorter and less glorious. Juve’s interest offers him a happy ending and Chelsea an opportunity to escape what could have become a damaging relationship.

It may feel unfair to Sarri to attribute much of credit to Eden Hazard, but the Belgian’s brilliance was such that he felt the inspiration. Chelsea will almost certainly be deprived of his 21 goals and 17 assists next season; if their transfer ban is upheld, they will be denied the opportunity to buy a replacement.

As many of Chelsea’s players scarcely suit Sarri, managing them could be a task for a pragmatist, making the most of the resources, or, given Chelsea’s battalion of youthful talents, an evangelist for youth. Sarri he is neither of those.

Hazard and Ruben Loftus-Cheek apart, too few performed to their potential under Sarri. His system meant some – Marcos Alonso, N’Golo Kante, David Luiz – were crowbarred into roles that did not match their strengths or, in some cases, camouflage weaknesses. Olivier Giroud, Callum Hudson-Odoi and Andreas Christensen were underused, Gary Cahill mistreated.

Chelsea’s squad, assembled by too many managers and powerbrokers and featuring too many declining players, presents a challenge for anyone, but the task requires a more flexible thinker. They rarely fitted Sarriball.

The phrase irritated Sarri himself. The shame was that Chelsea showed Sarriball at his best too rarely. In the Premier League, their possession rose from 54.4 per cent to 59.9, but scored a solitary goal more. It felt like possession without purpose.

And yet in the second half against Arsenal in Baku, they scored four times in 24 minutes. Mateo Kovacic, impotent so often, was incisive. Chelsea were inventive and irresistible in the manner of Sarri’s stylish Napoli, but the illuminations came courtesy of Hazard.

It was a glimpse of what might have been but, for manager and club alike, should not confuse them about what is best for both now.