"Is Maresca's Interest from Man City the Ultimate Test for Chelsea's Boehly? Letting Him Go Could Reveal Their True Intentions!"

ENZO MARESCA’S weird week just took another curious turn.

Fresh off the back of cryptically branding the build-up to Saturday’s win over Everton as “the worst 48 hours” of his Chelsea tenure,

Maresca’s already-interesting week has taken a surprise turnCredit: Getty Boehly congratulates Mresca after the Club World Cup win

And it potentially leaves the Blues higher-ups – whom everyone assumes Maresca was taking aim at with – in an unexpected scrap to keep him.

You would not blame Todd Boehly for feeling baffled.

If we are to read between the lines from Maresca’s outburst, which hinted at a lack of support for the job he is doing, it seems Boehly and his Clearlake consortium were still trying to work out if they even wanted the Italian long term.

Yet now there is a threat they could lose to one of their biggest Premier League rivals.

And to do so would leave many doubting how serious they are at returning the West Londoners to the top of English football.

If City really do end up identifying Maresca as best-placed to follow up the iconic Pep, how genuine could Chelsea’s hierarchy be in that ambition if they let him leave without a fight?

It is shaping up to be the biggest test the owners have faced during their three-and-a-half years calling the shots at Stamford Bridge.

and Co have never been afraid to make bold decisions since taking centre stage in the Premier League in May 2022, whether it be handing out mammoth contracts, selling off homegrown stars or ruthlessly hiring and firing managers.

Appointing Maresca in 2024 was another ballsy call.

The former midfielder had guided Leicester back to the Premier League the previous campaign but he had never actually managed in England’s top flight.

Yet Maresca has, for the most part, been a hit with the Blues since taking over from Mauricio Pochettino.

Last term in his first campaign, he guided the club to fourth, the Conference League title and then glory in the expanded Fifa Club World Cup in the summer.

Maresca has managed it too despite unconvincing options in attack and in goal, a squad so bloated he had to bomb some out, and a lack of vastly-experienced pros at his disposal.

No doubt he can call on some of the most talented individuals in world football, including , Estevao and Moises Caicedo.

It has not all been sweetness and light – ill-discipline on the pitch is a regular theme and the team are certainly capable of chucking in a shocker of a result, such as home defeats to Brighton and Sunderland.

Indeed, Maresca failed to win any of three games prior to the Everton win – losing at Leeds and Atalanta, with a draw at Bournemouth sandwiched in between.

It led to his mysterious rant after that 2-0 Toffees win where he claimed it had been “the worst 48 hours since I joined the club because people didn’t support me and the team”, before adding after Tuesday’s Carabao Cup win at Cardiff that he had not spoken with any of his bosses since.

But all in all, there has been obvious progress under the 45-year-old.

Chelsea are fourth in the league, through to the last four of the Carabao Cup and in a decent enough position to make knock-outs of the Champions League, thanks in part to a blistering win over Barcelona.

, under whom Maresca worked as an assistant at City for the 2022-23 season before going to Leicester, said just a few weeks ago that “the job he has done at Chelsea does not get enough credit.”

Just how much credit Boehly, Behdad Eghbali and the Blues hierarchy give Maresca will become apparent over the coming months with City looming – as will their ambition for Chelsea.

Guardiola has made City a global powerhouse and replacing him won’t be easyCredit: Getty