Chelsea will move to appoint Zinedine Zidane if they sack Maurizio Sarri according to the Sun, but this would just be a negative step back to typical Chelsea.

The Blues have had 10 managers, interim and so-called permanent, in the last 11 years, but it seemed Sarri’s appointment was different. It looked like Chelsea wanted to create an identity in the way Barcelona and Manchester City have done and give the club continuity. That would all change if Sarri was sacked and Zidane was brought in.

Yes, things aren’t going well for Chelsea at the moment and questions are being asked about whether ‘Sarriball’ will ever work in the Premier League. But the same questions were asked of Pep Guardiola in the 2016/17 season, and then look what happened the season after.

If Chelsea really want to create a footballing identity for the club, a style of football and way of doing things that isn’t sacking managers until you get results, then they have to give Sarri time. Zidane would be the complete opposite to building that structure, as Jose Mourinho is too.

Managers like those will play in any way to win. That’s all well and good if you’re winning and would rather focus on the short-term not the long-term, but clubs like Barcelona and Manchester City would never employ Zidane or Jose Mourinho. They lack an ideology and care for the future.

If Sarri was sacked and Zidane brought in, it would be a complete revert to the Chelsea we’re all used to. They’ll have a manager who will be successful for a short period and then he’ll leave. Zidane won three Champions League titles at Real Madrid, got bored and left, so how long would he last with the inevitably reduced success he’d have at Chelsea?

Short-termism has been replaced by long-term planning at the world’s top clubs and if Chelsea don’t find a way to integrate a philosophy like Sarri's, they could find themselves miles off the pace in a few years