The English midfielder is ‘different’ from his teammate from Chelsea – Maresco

Cole Palmer Panenko’s penalty in Chelsea’s thrilling win at Tottenham showed the “freedom” the England midfielder shares with “a lot of top players”, Blues manager Enzo Maresca said as his top scorer looks to add to his 11 top-flight goals this season.

Prolific Palmer’s audacious strike was his second penalty after the break in his side’s 4-3 win at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, having recovered from 2-0 down after 11 minutes to be second ahead of this weekend’s clash.

“Cole is different from the others, but we have a lot of good players that a head coach – in this case me – would feel happy and proud to work with,” said Maresca, whose side are two points clear of Arsenal and four behind leaders Liverpool. , playing a game more than the Reds.

“A lot of top players have that (composure at key moments) – they look like they don’t care, but that’s just their way and being that way gives them more freedom.

“I can relax and you can see that Cole is the same. Cole was like that five years ago and he’s still the same. You don’t have to expend energy trying to convince him to be different.”

Together. pic.twitter.com/W28J0WmkU0

— Chelsea FC (@ChelseaFC) December 10, 2024

Cole Palmer goals

Palmer’s additional six assists in 15 Premier League games puts his direct goals this season behind Mohamed Salah, who has scored 13 goals and scored eight in 14 games for Liverpool.

None of Palmer’s 22 Premier League goals last season came in the 180 minutes he played against Brentford, who host Chelsea on Sunday (1900 GMT) – although he did set up Axel Disasi’s 83rd-minute equalizer in their a 2-2 draw away to the Bees on March 2.

“He behaves exactly the way he should, focusing on football and the important things,” added Maresca. “The most important thing is that he loves football.

📸#CFC | #TOTCHE pic.twitter.com/yngCfaVlMM

— Chelsea FC (@ChelseaFC) December 9, 2024

“He is always one of the first to go to training, starts playing with the ball and at that moment you can see who really loves football and who is just playing football.

“He’s only 22 and there’s a lot of things he can improve on… at the moment everyone marks him as a man to man.”

Palmer’s omission from Chelsea’s Conference League squad meant he was not part of their 3-1 win at Kazakhstan club Astana on Thursday, when Marc Guiu and Renato Veiga scored either side of an Aleksandr Marochkin own goal to give the visitors a 3-0 lead after 39 points. . minute.

Chelsea v Brentford

Chelsea have lost three times and drawn twice in their last five meetings with Brentford, last beating them at home in the league in 1946.

Each of those defeats came at Stamford Bridge, Thomas Frank’s side following a 4-1 defeat in April 2022 with back-to-back 2-0 wins.