Xabi Alonso's Chelsea rebuild: How Leverkusen glory explains the plan to recruit role models

It was in 2008 that Jordan Henderson made his Premier League debut. Chelsea – think Joe Cole, Deco and the rest – were the opposition and beat Sunderland 5-0. Two weeks later, Danny Welbeck marked his own debut with a goal for Manchester United.

If that feels like a different era, it is because it was. Barack Obama won the election to become the 44th president of the United States that month. Pep Guardiola was just starting out in management. The man in charge of Chelsea was Luiz Felipe Scolari.

With apologies to Henderson and Welbeck, the two young players who combined for Chelsea's opening goal against Western Sydney Wanderers - Dastayen Satpaev and Reggie Walsh - were born that year. Ryan Kavuma-McQueen? He was still in the womb.

Which is one way of illustrating that strategic pivots do not get more conspicuous than this. Chelsea have not featured a player over the age of 30 in two years and not paid for one in four. Now they are signing veterans. And the word is that Xabi Alonso is driving it.

If it is a reaction to concerns over a lack of leadership within the Chelsea dressing room that would be understandable given how badly they faded towards the back end of last season. But this is as much about Alonso's experience as the lack of it inside Cobham.

For the new Chelsea manager - not head coach, remember - this is a template that he knows can work. It was one of the key lessons of his success at Bayer Leverkusen, the German club that he dramatically transformed into invincible double winners in 2024.

Leverkusen had the second youngest team in the Bundesliga in the preceding season. Their reputation for delivering young talent but not trophies long pre-dated that. Alonso took them to a sixth-placed finish that year but he wanted a win-now mentality instead.

In came Granit Xhaka and Jonas Hofmann, both over the age of 30 and uncharacteristic Leverkusen signings. Alex Grimaldo joined just before his 28th birthday. Simon Rolfes, the club's sporting director, talked of the need to provide the team with role models.

It was a sea change for Leverkusen. The previous summer, their biggest signing had been Adam Hlozek, a Czech teenager from Sparta Prague. Callum Hudson-Odoi, loaned from Chelsea, was perhaps the most high-profile arrival. It was a disparate group.

Speaking to Rolfes at the Bay Arena in Leverkusen in the aftermath of their stunning success, he explained the thinking behind the shift in strategy. They had been burned by their previous experiences, including some scatter-gun recruitment in 2021 as well.

"Besides the technical, tactical and physical skills, the personality also is crucial, and if this is bad, in our opinion, we will not sign the player," explained Rolfes. "That was also a key learning from our season two years before, when we really struggled."

Rolfes himself has long been a public advocate of the use of data in recruitment. But he realised that they had to look beyond the numbers again. "We had to take a deeper look into this project about how we analysed players, what characteristics we wanted."

It could not be about talent and talent alone: "He looks good but what is he like mentally?"

In addition to the trio of signings in 2023, Rolfes pointed to the example of Robert Andrich, a dominant midfielder who became a symbol of Leverkusen's success.

In what is arguably the most pointed contrast to Chelsea's recruitment strategy of recent years, Andrich was almost 25 years old when he made his Bundesliga debut for Union Berlin. His was a very different route.

"Robert is for me a fantastic role model," Rolfes said. "He has had a very special way to the top and that is what I like. A lot of top players are more or less the best in their academy, they make it really early. Robert really worked, made it step by step and then became an international player at 29. I really like this.

"He was always able to adapt to the next level. It shows that with a good mentality, with intrinsic motivation, you can achieve a lot. Sometimes, young, high-potential players have to learn this because they are so skilful they are used to being better than others."

Henderson and Welbeck are older than these Leverkusen leaders are now - let alone the age they were back when Alonso achieved what many thought was impossible in Germany. But could they prove just as effective in helping to inspire? Could they unlock more from others?

As Rolfes pointed out that day in Leverkusen, balance is everything. "Our goal is not to have 25 players alike. You need different characteristics. Introverts and extroverts. Leadership guys." Belatedly, with the help of Alonso, Chelsea might have realised that.