Lampard preaches patience amid Werner goal drought

Timo Werner isn’t scoring many goals for Chelsea these days — in fact, the 24-year-old German international hasn’t scored a goal in 44 days — but Frank Lampard insists that “a run” of goals will come with just a little bit of patience.

[ MORE: Pulisic Watch: USMNT star, Chelsea attack muted in West Ham win ]

Werner had two of the game’s best scoring chances in Chelsea’s 3-0 victory over West Ham United on Monday, but the Blues’ $61-million summer signing hit the first one straight into the feet of Lukasz Fabianski in the first half and thundered the second look at goal off the crossbar in the game’s final few minutes. It’s a frustrating time for Werner, and Chelsea fans, but Lampard has given zero indications of wavering confidence.

Of course, Lampard can preach, and also practice, patience with Timo Werner when Olivier Giroud has eight goals in his last five starts (all competitions) and Tammy Abraham chips in with a brace as he did on Monday — quotes from the BBC:

“It was nice to see that at the end because we had a period at 1-0 where it was tough, we dealt with that well. Once we got the second goal, Kovacic came on and got us up the pitch and we could have had more goals in the end.

“That’s the period Timo (Werner) is in — it’s unfortunate, but he’s getting in the positions. When on goes in, it will be a run for him. Tammy and Oli (Giroud) both bring different things. Tammy did his thing today, and that’s what we needed.”

…

“Olivier Giroud has been playing well and scoring goals, you have to look at the opposition and they have different attributes. We did not know whether they would play a back three or four and with Tammy Abraham’s natural ability to move in behind it would have suited us better today. We judged it on the opposition and Tammy came up trumps, Oli produces whenever he plays.”

Here’s a discussion point from PST’s recap of Chelsea 3-0 West Ham, in which we discussed Lampard’s tactical decisions which, in our opinion, are affecting Timo Werner and his performances a great deal:

Abraham’s hold-up play is fantastic, but can only be used at center forward, which is where Werner is best suited to play, so Werner gets pushed out to the left wing so he can remain somewhat goal-dangerous, but that means Christian Pulisic then has to move to the right wing where he’s far less involved. The tactical dominoes are falling the wrong direction for Lampard.

Up next for Chelsea is a Boxing Day (Saturday) showdown with 15th-place Arsenal at the Emirates Stadium (Watch live, 12:30 pm ET, on NBC and online via NBCSports.com).

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