Mendy growing in confidence seeking fifth successive Chelsea clean sheet
Chelsea were linked with a host of new goalkeepers to replace Kepa before they settled on Edouard Mendy in September. A host of big name shotstoppers were supposedly courted by the Blues until they plumped for the Senegal star, who has made a fine impact on the back of his arrival at Stamford Bridge.
Indeed, in his first five games as a Chelsea player, Mendy has kept four clean sheets and conceded just one goal, the same record as Petr Cech back in 2004. The former Blues number one was instrumental in convincing the club to land Mendy and the west London outfit are benfitting from his recommendation.
Four of the five clean sheets Chelsea have kept this season have come with Mendy between the sticks, with a 6-0 Carabao Cup win over Barnsley the exception. Frank Lampard will be hoping the Senegalese shotstopper can extend that record when the Blues make the trip to Burnley on Saturday.
Chelsea have won five of their last six trips to Burnley, who themselves are struggling at the wrong end of the table. A 1-0 home loss to Tottenham on Monday leaves the Clarets mired in the relegation zone with one point from five, and both teams could be coming into the weekend's clash under very different circumstances had Chelsea followed up their lead for a different goalkeeper.
Nick Pope was a rumoured goalkeeping target for Lampard over the summer as a replacement for Kepa before Cech's recommendation for former Rennes man Mendy and the rest, as they say, is history. Whereas Pope has struggled to match his best form, in part due to the ongoing absence of Ben Mee in the Burnley backline, Mendy goes from strength to strength in a Chelsea shirt.
As Chelsea came away from their Champions League trip to Krasnodar with a 4-0 win in tow, Mendy put in his best rated performance of the season, earning a WhoScored rating of 7.87, that enough to make the team of the week. This season in every competition, including his final game with Rennes, Mendy's rating has been steadily improving and with it, the Blues backline looks all the more solid than it once did with Kepa and Willy Caballero between the sticks.
That's not say Mendy hasn't endured a couple of iffy moments, with his distribution causing some heart-in-throat moments, but on the whole, the 28-year-old is proving a solid capture. The noticeable difference is the confidence he excudes as the last line of defence. With Kepa, the backline had no faith in the Spaniard and understandably so. The goalkeeper has committed an error leading to an opposition goal in each of his three Premier League appearances this season, while a WhoScored rating of 5.48 is the lowest in 2020/21.
What's crucial, though, is that Mendy came through a testing debut at Tottenham with a WhoScored rating of 5.96, and yet has still managed to quickly win over the Chelsea faithful. A first appearance at a London rival was always going to be a testing affair, and Mendy struggled to really impose himself at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium, particularly in the penalty shootout. Yet he showed the mental fortitude to quickly move on from the fairly sub-par showing to keep a clean sheet in his last four competitive outings.
With each passing game, Mendy appears to be growing with confidence as he settles into his new surroundings and, if results go Chelsea's way over the weekend, then he could end the gameweek joint-top in the Golden Glove race, a solid record given Saturday's trip to Burnley will mark just his third Premier League appearance in a Chelsea shirt.
Hardly the household name prior to his move to Chelsea, Mendy's continuing to grow into his role as the west London side's number one and there are few, if any, goalkeepers fans would now swap for the former Rennes man.
