Romeo Lavia offers future hope for Chelsea as Manchester City show how far they have to go

LONDON -- Most of the faithful making their way to Stamford Bridge on this restive Sunday afternoon would not have needed the 90 minutes that lay ahead of them to learn just how great the gap was between their side and the one their owners aspire to match on and off the pitch. Three years ago Chelsea and Manchester City were one and two in Europe. Three years from now, the former would have undergone one of the most impressive of rises if they were any near the Champions League final they won before everything was torn up by the new ownership.

Still, one of the few advantages of the raft of near-decade-length contracts is that there is no need to push the pace for the sake of it. Well, except the best part of $200 million in amortized transfer fees that built a squad that Sunday had no one who was in Porto for one of the greatest nights in Chelsea's history. That financial hole is going to need plugging for the next few seasons.

A problem for someone other than Enzo Maresca, however. The evidence of this 2-0 defeat is that a fair few of his own will rear their head as another coach attempts to stamp his mark on a squad whose every strength and conditioning session looks like a suburban gym on Jan. 3 when the nation's post-Christmas bloat must be squashed down. Raheem Sterling wanted answers over his absence. Many supporters wanted the same over Conor Gallagher's. Even so, there was enough in Game one to suggest that patience might be rewarded if only ownership can bring themselves to show it. Sticking it out until the Game is actually over might be a good starting point for Todd Boehly.

So would accepting that there will be moments like that when Bernardo Silva and Erling Haaland breezed through the chasms in the Chelsea backline for the latter to poke home the opener. Chelsea might have spent £200 million on younger models but there will be occasions when the experience of a Mateo Kovacic pays dividends, as it did when he stole through midfield and curved a fine shot beyond Robert Sanchez.

Their greatest mistakes might have been ruthlessly punished but there was much to admire in how Chelsea stuck to their task between those goals, no matter the pressure that came from the defending champions. Each of their first five passing moves ran aground before they had got out of their own half but Maresca's men stuck to Plan A. They weren't just going to play through the press, they were going to provoke it, even if that made their own supporters grumble. When things went right moans became murmurs of approval as Chelsea pushed possession into the places they wanted to be.

Ending the first half with 13 touches in the penalty area, more than City allowed in all bar two Premier League matches last season, was not to be sniffed at. The touch they really wanted in the box never quite came, Enzo Fernandez rather too willing to hurl himself to the deck when Ruben Dias so much as breathed in his direction. Nicolas Jackson continued last season's twin trends of inopportune offsides and high xG misses; still, he is at least getting in the right spots.

That was rather the tale of Chelsea's season opener, the sort of display that if repeated often enough will yield results. In no instance was that quite as true as it was with Romeo Lavia, utterly fearless as his first Premier League start for his current club brought him up against the side who had brought him to England. You could see why as he eased his way around the frontline he might have been shielding if he had opted to stick around in the City academy rather than make the move to Southampton.

"I think there were a lot of positives to take from the game," said Lavia. "We were expecting goals today and we had a lot of chances. We need to take the positives and move on.

"We felt like we had the chance to come out on top and that didn't happen. It's a very good team so we have to take the good things and move on to the next game. You can find a lot of reasons why they won today. Just focus on the next one.

"There are 38 games in the season. There's something growing and you can see that on the pitch. The result didn't go our way today but the way we played is where we want to be."

Following an injury-riddled year in which ankle and hamstring issues limited him to a little over half an hour of Football, Lavia played like a man ready to get a move on. Whenever Haaland or Kevin De Bruyne bore down on his teaMMAtes, the 20-year-old was showing for a pass, ready to take possession and move it on with precision. It took him 45 minutes and 28 successful attempts before one of Lavia's passes fell short. His precise balls out to the flank got Malo Gusto and Christopher Nkunku driving into dangerous areas. The confusion of some supporters around Maresca's bench when it was his number that shone on the fourth official's board rather than Fernandez's, their assessment was arguably vindicated as Chelsea fell off the pace after Lavia and Jackson exited in the 68th minute.

Fernandez's own off day, one with more tumbles than chances created, was a reminder of the challenges that come with accruing talent at the pace Chelsea have. With Moises Caicedo looking solid alongside Lavia, can Fernandez fit in without being shoehorned in by dint of his price? Frank Lampard and Mauricio Pochettino both seemed unsure whether the Premier League's most expensive player was better at the base of midfield, where his defensive qualities seem lacking, or the tip, where the shots and chances are not quite sufficient.

Such is the challenge for Maresca, one that will be all the more pronounced in the early months of his tenure. Finding something in Lavia makes for a headache around Fernandez. A bright cameo off the bench by Pedro Neto will hardly make it easier for Sterling to regain a place in the squad after he gets the clarity he wants over his future.

It will not be easy and defeat to City offered a Healthy reminder both of how swiftly this club has fallen out of the Game's elite and how far they must go to get back there. But time is on the side of their best and brightest. If a few more can follow Lavia's example over the weeks ahead then Chelsea might at least find they are on the right path.