If Davide Zappacosta is your answer, you probably don’t understand the question.
Maurizio Sarri’s determination to live or die at Chelsea by his ‘Sarri-ball’ philosophy reached a new low here with the gradual rejection of his ideas spreading from the players to the stands.
Blues fans were already chanting “F*** Sarri-ball” and “you don’t know what you’re doing” before, at 2-0 down to a Manchester United side defending deep and refusing to be prised open, Sarri ignored calls for Callum Hudson-Odoi and switched one right-back for another.
In fairness, Cesar Azpilicueta had endured a torrid second half, terrified by United’s counter-attacking pace and Marcus Rashford in particular, but his substitution for Zappacosta also represented a doubling down of the dogma that has come to paralyse this club.
United did what Tottenham, Arsenal and others have done before them: detail an advanced central midfielder with the task of interrupting passing between Chelsea’s centre-backs and playmaker Jorginho while denying the latter space to play out from deep-lying central areas.
Juan Mata did what Dele Alli, Aaron Ramsey and others have done before them. Jorginho looked horribly lost at times as yet another midfield diamond nullified the home side after a briefly promising start.
United have rarely played in such a system and it is precisely the type of tactical tweak Sarri seems either unwilling or incapable of making to this ailing Chelsea outfit.
United interim boss Ole Gunnar Solskjaer told Standard Sport: “There’s different ways of stopping a team and they’ve got so many good players.
“Juan did a fantastic job between the two centre-backs and Jorginho. He ran his socks off, he stopped [David] Luiz when he had to, he stopped Jorginho when he had to and he ran up to [Antonio] Rudiger a few times so I thought his work-rate was phenomenal.”
The effect it had in giving United a foothold in this FA Cup fifth-round tie was also predictable, offering further evidence that Sarri either has to introduce fresh nuance to his preferred approach or the penny must drop this week in the most improbable fashion.
Finding a way past Malmo should be relatively straightforward given a 2-1 lead from the first leg of their Europa League last 32 tie but Sunday’s League Cup Final against Manchester City will have a few at Cobham shifting around uneasily already.