Chelsea news: Jorginho has played 1,896 passes without registering a Premier League assist

Jorginho arrived at Chelsea with the reputation of a player who could dictate the tempo of games in midfield with slick and accurate passing.

Signed from Napoli for £57m last summer, the Italy international quickly established himself at the heart of Chelsea's midfield, with Maurizio Sarri assigning him role of conductor to make the Blues tick.

Chelsea news: Jorginho has played 1,896 passes without registering a Premier League assist

And it all went according to plan at the beginning of the season. An impressive pre-season was followed up with an unorthodox penalty on his debut in a 3-0 win over Huddersfield.

The midfielder had 186 touches of the ball in a 2-1 win over Newcastle United, a joint record with Fernandinho, and he then broke another one.

This time, it was for the most passes in a Premier League game, completing 180 in the goalless draw against West Ham in September.

Chelsea went 12 matches unbeaten and their new 'pass-master' was rightly lauded for his contributions to their title challenge alongside Liverpool and Manchester City.

Their pursuit quickly fell apart following a 3-1 defeat to Tottenham in late November, where Jorginho was man-marked by Dele Alli, and Chelsea have since endured an indifferent run of form.

Following a 0-0 draw with Southampton, a statistic has emerged which epitomises his recent performances.

Jorginho has played an incredible 1,896 passes so far this campaign, more than any other player, without recording a single assist and this has caused Chelsea fans to grow frustrated with the lack of attacking threat from their midfield, in which N'golo Kante and Ross Barkley are joint top scorers in that position with three goals each.

Aymeric Laporte (1,791) and Antonio Rudiger (1,718), both defenders, have played the second and third most passes this season.

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