Neither Mount nor Havertz have made a quick start to life at Manchester United or Arsenal, although neither is anywhere close to being judged as poor signings yet. Mount picked up an injury in his second competitive game and Havertz is only four matches into his Arsenal career.
There is mitigation for both players. They both saw their confidence sapped during difficult seasons in 2022/23. Chelsea&aposs collective nightmare affected every player and it&aposs only natural that will take time to get over.
Mount and Havertz are not only adapting to new surroundings on the back of disappointing seasons, but they are settling into new roles as well and that will take time.
Havertz is being repurposed as a left-sided No. 8 for Arsenal, playing the kind of advanced, creative midfield role he often filled for Bayer Leverkusen but never quite made his own at Chelsea. Last season 29 of his 43 appearances came as a centre-forward, with only 10 in an attacking midfield role, although plenty of them were as a No. 10 and a shadow striker, more than a No. 8.
Only a third of Havertz&aposs 139 games for Chelsea were in any kind of midfield role. That&aposs a contrast to his time at Bayer, where more than 100 of his 150 games came in midfield. Arsenal and Mikel Arteta want that version of Havertz, but they will have to show patience to unlock him, with his game changing during his time at Stamford Bridge.
It&aposs a similar story for Mount. Erik ten Hag&aposs admiration for the player began during his loan spell with Vitesse Arnhem in 2017/18, with the teenager impressing in the Eredivisie. Mount played 39 games that season and 37 of them were in the kind of central midfield role Ten Hag is asking him to play at United.
But at Chelsea and with England he&aposs never quite had that position to himself. Mount played 195 times for Chelsea after emerging from their academy and occupied every position across midfield and attack. Only 34 of those games were in a traditional central midfield position, with 122 in a more attacking midfield role.
So now that Mount is once again being asked to be an all-action midfielder for Ten Hag, it might be understandable it&aposs not coming naturally straightaway. It&aposs certainly context as to why he might not have hit the ground running at Old Trafford.
The version of Mount that Ten Hag wants is that 2017/18 player, the midfielder who could get forward and be a threat in attack, while also linking play from deep. He rarely had to do that at Chelsea, where he was regularly used in a role that focused mostly on the final third.
It&aposs interesting to hear Mount&aposs take on his best position and the role he feels he can play. In November last year, during the World Cup, he described his own game in terms that feel akin to what Ten Hag wants from him.
“I like to think I&aposm a traditional midfielder even though I can play a number of roles for the team,” he said. “I&aposve always said that I&aposm best as a No.8 and I&aposve played there ever since I was a young kid.
“I like to work from box-to-box, help out defensively but also get forward to score and assist goals for the team. That&aposs where I think my strengths are. I&aposm versatile, so I can adapt and play higher up or a lot deeper.
