Exiting Chelsea last November to take up a similar role at AS Monaco, Michael Emenalo still hasn’t been replaced at Stamford Bridge.
Marina Granovskaia stepped in as interim technical director, and played a major role in first swapping Antonio Conte with Maurizio Sarri before bringing in a couple of players for the Italian manager.
Profiling the Nigerian director, Le Journal du Dimanche lift the lid on Emenalo’s relationships within the club during his time there, helped by Christophe Lollichon, who oversees goalkeeping coaching at Chelsea.
He said: “Michael helped Roman Abramovich a lot with his football knowledge and how the game works, especially. He’s intellectually honest, which is quite rare.
“From Villas-Boas to Conte via Mourinho, he always worked to build with his coaches and anticipate difficult situations. Some didn’t understand it. Others did, but often too late”.
Clearly a key member of the club, having an influence on what happened on the pitch as well as off it, Emenalo eventually resigned, which shocked a lot of people, even if he himself knew it was probably going to happen for a while.
Le JDD explain the technical director was aware he was ‘expected at Monaco’ way before his move to the principality club, and it was the ‘power struggles’ with Marina Granovskaia that ‘exhausted him’ enough to quit.
It’s a new era at Chelsea now, but it seems the club are still trying to find a replacement, wanting to make sure they get the right man to continue the work he set up during his 10 or so years at Stamford Bridge.
