Why Jamie Carragher was impressed by Thomas Tuchel after Arsenal defeat

Chelsea’s defeat to Arsenal this week was a real stinger. It felt like the culmination of a lot of bad vibes this summer, crystalised into a really awful 90 minutes.

The easy thing for manager Thomas Tuchel to do would have been to play it down. His squad were less prepared that Arsenal, had fewer minutes in their legs, and his signings had arrived more recently.

But he didn’t – in fact the manager took the defeat very seriously, despite the fact it came in a friendly. That attitude impressed Jamie Carragher, who thought it was a mature way to deal with the loss.

“You’re still playing for Chelsea, you’re playing Arsenal, and it’s a big game. I know it’s a pre-season friendly but you shouldn’t be getting beat 4-0, and I actually quite admired how seriously he was taking it,” Carragher said in quotes picked up by the Evening Standard.

“Because I don’t think they should massively be getting carried away, but I don’t think they should be getting massively beaten by Arsenal two weeks before the start of the season.”

He’s spot on. None of us should be losing our minds about it – we’re still heavy favourites to beat Everton when the Premier League season starts next weekend – but equally this was very troubling, and not at all what you want to see at this point in your summer.

If it sparks the club into some transfer action that’s great, but it needed to be hammered home to the players that losing like that isn’t acceptable, no matter whether it’s a friendly game or not.

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