James, who was named Chelsea captain before the start of last season, missed the first couple of months of this campaign with a hamstring injury.
The 24-year-old marked his return from the treatment room in last weekend’s defeat to Liverpool, impressing for 53 minutes before being taken off following his long lay-off.
Maresca took over at Stamford Bridge in July and says he ‘expected more’ from Blues captain James, who he says is not a ‘proper leader’.
‘I spoke with him and I expected from him more in terms of leadership, inside the changing room and for different kinds of things,’ Maresca said.
‘He’s on the way, he’s doing well, he’s progressing, but from Reece I expected more also in terms of leadership.
‘Most of the time when they are captain, they think that because they are captain they have more – “Because I am the captain, I expect that you give me more.”
‘For me, because you are the captain, you have to give more. You have to give more than the rest.
‘And sometimes it’s, “OK, I am the captain I can give less.” No. He’s one of the captains and I expected from him, and his team-mates expected from him, to give always more in terms of leadership in general.’
The ex-Leicester City boss added: ‘He [James] is a reserved guy, as you said, but not only him. When you don’t have a proper leader, you need to build that.
‘I think we don’t have a proper leader. We don’t have those guys. Probably Tosin [Adarabioyo] is one of the guys that is.
‘So the rest, we need to build them. Reece is on the way but he’s not there. So he needs to make an effort in that one.
‘The one that is doing fantastic in this kind of thing is Levi [Colwill]. Levi probably at the beginning of the season was not a leader but now you can see that he is one of the guys that is always speaking. We need to build that.
‘We need as much as we can, then it’s perfect. Marc Cucurella is one of the guys, so we need more and more.
‘This something that also goes with the age. Probably in one or two years, three years, some of them will be better in that.
‘But, as I said, if they are not there we need to help them to understand, not only the football side, also leadership side that they need to grow.’
James was rested for Chelsea’s Europa League clash against Panathinaikos on Thursday night but is expected to feature in Sunday’s Premier League game at home to Newcastle United.
The right-back has made 159 appearances for the Blues since breaking into the first-team in 2019.
When fit, he is viewed as one of the best players in the world in his position, but James has struggled with injury issues and only played 11 games last season.
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