BT Sport put it to Thomas Tuchel after the game today that part of Chelsea’s poor performance was down to a lack of service to Romelu Lukaku.
Relations are presumably pretty delicate between the manager and his mega signing striker, so he could have just agreed. But instead he didn’t shy away from criticising the striker, as you can see in his quotes here:
Tuchel on BT Sport: "Lukaku sometimes needs to do the service, he is included in this, he had many ball losses in very promising circumstances, he had a huge chance. Of course we want to serve him, but he is part of the team, and the performance up front, we can do much better."
— Nizaar Kinsella (@NizaarKinsella) January 15, 2022
We like his honesty, and he is right. For all that there was a paucity of good opportunities created for him, he didn’t make the most of those that did come his way.
A bad pass here, a bad decision there, it all adds up. He was not exactly singled out by Tuchel here, but the coach made sure his forward took his share of the blame for a poor attacking showing.
Let’s hope they can keep working on fitting the forward into the formation better, to get some better performances from him.
