Enzo Maresca urges Cole Palmer to keep cool in the face of aggressive man marking now that rivals are ‘worried’ about the Chelsea star man – as Blues look to break 11-year winless streak at Man United

Enzo Maresca says Cole Palmer better get used to Premier League opponents assigning a man to mark him out of games because the world’s best players have to handle that.

Chelsea try to help Palmer by tweaking his positioning week by week if their pre-match analysis suggests he will be targeted.

In last weekend’s 2-1 win over Newcastle, for example, Maresca moved the 22-year-old towards the left-hand side of the pitch rather than the right like usual to keep him away from Joelinton.

Chelsea travel to Manchester United today in search of their first win at Old Trafford since May 2013, when Sir Alex Ferguson was still in charge. Not for the first time, Palmer may find he has a shadow following him for the majority of the match as Maresca said: ‘I am ready for that but Cole, I don’t know if he’s ready!

‘The next step for Cole is not to get frustrated when teams mark him man to man, because all of the best players in the world are marked man to man.

Chelsea boss deployed Palmer on the left against Newcastle to keep him away from Joelinton

The decision proved to be wise as Palmer ultimately netted the winner against Eddie Howe’s side

‘Probably it was the opposite (last season). They weren’t too worried about marking Cole. They are now worried because of last year so now he has to get used to it. The next step is going to be more difficult but he can do it.’

On what can be done to combat opponents’ obsession with Palmer, Maresca continued: ‘The only thing we can do is what we did against Newcastle. The reason he was playing on the other side was because Joelinton would have been marking him man to man.

‘We tried to move him and give him some different options and space. But he’s going to be marked man to man in so many games.’

Meanwhile, Maresca also launched into a defence of Enzo Fernandez, Chelsea’s £105million midfielder who cannot now get in their Premier League line-up ahead of Moises Caicedo and Romeo Lavia. Fernandez has faced criticism for his subpar performances, while he was also installed as a deputy captain despite his racism storm in the summer while away with Argentina.

‘They are human beings and if you pay £100m that is not my problem,’ Maresca said. ‘You want to buy me then you pay that money. That does not mean that every game you have to be the best. At the end of the day they are football players and they cannot always be at the top level.

Maresca also defended Enzo Fernandez, who has found first-team minutes increasingly hard to come by in recent weeks

‘At this moment Enzo is not playing but there is no problem with Enzo. The noise about Enzo is because clubs pay so much money for them, people expect they will always be the best. That is not so.’

The only player missing for Chelsea on Sunday is Jadon Sancho, who is ineligible to face his parent club. Sancho is also still getting over an illness.