What is Chelsea's best centre-back pairing?

David Luiz (L) and Gary Cahill

Chelsea, once again under the management of Jose Mourinho, have been a work-in-progress so far this season. While the Blues have looked good in patches, there are still quite a few wrinkles to iron out.

Mourinho himself has described this team as a team in ‘transition’, a phrase last heard of at the club when a certain Andre Villas-Boas was in charge.

Nevertheless, the Portuguese manager is spot on in saying that his current Chelsea side are in transition. With many new faces coming in and a few old faces on the verge of being phased out, this new side will need time before it performs to its potential.

One of Mourinho’s main problems has been his defensive combination. The Special One is yet to figure out his best defensive combination. It was a problem that plagued Rafael Benitez last season as well, mainly due to each of his centre-back options having certain limitations. Nevertheless, Mourinho has stated that he is happy with his current squad. Keeping that in mind, let’s take a look at what is Chelsea’s best centre-back pairing at the moment.

Chelsea’s four centre-backs are John Terry, David Luiz, Gary Cahill and Tomas Kalas. Mourinho has already said that he sees Branislav Ivanovic as a right-back so he won’t be considered even though he can be deployed in that position.

Of the four defenders mentioned, John Terry is aging and has struggled a lot with injuries so it’s fair to say he will no longer be his first-choice. Even Mourinho confirmed that Terry will have to earn his place in the side. That being said, Terry never had an issue sitting on the bench under Benitez last season so his regular absence from the starting XI shouldn’t be much of a problem.

Tomas Kalas is a decent defender but won’t be thrown into the deep end just yet. Therefore, it seems likely that Cahill-Luiz will be the preferred pair to line up in defence.

The Cahill-Luiz pairing works well as it is somewhat reminiscent of the Carvalho-Terry combination that was so successful during Mourinho’s first spell at the club. Carvalho was solid in defence and excellent in his ball distribution while Terry was an old-fashioned English defender who couldn’t be beaten in the air or on the ground. Together, they worked wonders.

People might see Luiz as a liability, but the truth is his style of defending is unorthodox, yet it works more often than not. Despite what people think, the fact that he rushes off the line to intercept passes isn’t much of a problem; what’s truly the problem with him is careless mistakes (such as back-heeling the ball to an opponent striker). The fact that he can play the ball out of defence also makes him extremely useful.

Cahill isn’t exactly perfect either. He can be extremely solid but is prone to the silliest of errors such as backing off when defenders run at him. Mourinho will have to work hard to get these two working together. Yet these two are Chelsea’s best centre-backs at the moment.

Terry will be used whenever Mourinho feels the need to shut shop or add an extra dimension of physicality to his side and Kalas will be gradually phased in to the team. Till then, Mourinho must stick with Gary Cahill and David Luiz as his first-choice centre-backs.