CRUNCH TIME
Tuchel urges Chelsea to deliver as they face up to pivotal week
DO NOT overthink it — that’s the resounding message from Thomas Tuchel as Chelsea move into the most pivotal week of their season. It all hangs on the next five days. Tonight, Chelsea take a 2-0 first-leg advantage into their Champions League quarter-final against Porto. Then, on Saturday, they face Manchester City for a place in their second successive FA Cup final.
It’s make or break time for Chelsea — not that Tuchel was buying into the hype yesterday.
‘Everybody can wreck their heads about it, but we are there to play football. This is the target, and the challenge actually, to keep focus,’ explained the German.
‘If we want to finish the season with a trophy, we’d better win both matches. Otherwise it could be difficult.
‘It doesn’t help to reflect too much about it, we have to play these games, but it’s most important for me to be fully focused on what we do, and forget that we have a lead from the first leg because it’s the past.
‘There’s nothing less interesting in football than the past. Everything that counts in football is the next match, the next competition.
‘We are in the second leg of the quarter-final of the Champions League, you will not find any team who does not have the goal to reach the semi-final.
‘We are in the semi-final of the FA Cup and have the chance to arrive in the final. If we arrive in the final then we have the chance to win.
‘There is nothing to hide. This is a club that has a culture, a structure, to win titles and win games consecutively. Chelsea is a club that has the culture, the history and mentality to do so.’
It was sound advice from a man who appears to have the golden touch.
Chelsea’s season had fallen flat when Tuchel replaced Frank Lampard in January. Qualifying for next season’s Champions League domestically appeared an outside bet, while the prospect of facing Atletico Madrid — who were among the in-form teams in Europe at the time — in the Champions League last-16 wasn’t something those with Chelsea connections were getting too encouraged over.
Fast-forward three months and Tuchel’s impact has been nothing short of miraculous. One defeat in 17 matches in all competitions has resuscitated Chelsea’s season.
Their top-four aspirations are firmly back on track and tonight they should, barring a collapse of epic proportions, reach their first Champions League semi-final since 2014.
Yet Tuchel is refusing to get ahead of himself — despite his team’s 2-0 cushion heading into tonight’s home leg in Seville.
‘I think in terms of adapting to the result in the first leg, it’s easier for Porto because they know very well what they need to do, they need to score three goals if they want to go through,’ said Tuchel.
‘For us, if we start adapting we could easily lose our heads. Because what does it mean? That it’s enough to lose 1-0? It’s good to have a draw, or better to have 1-0 for us. Why should we enter into this thinking?
‘This is the challenge, to not lose your head. I hope we embrace the challenge, I hope we have the feeling this is a match everyone waits for since they were a little kid.
‘Everybody wants to play Champions League, everybody wants to be part of it, everybody wants to have a decisive match.
‘But forget the result, we have to deliver. If we don’t deliver, you cannot expect any results.’
On recent evidence, expect Chelsea’s players to deliver, and then some, in Spain this evening.
(probable, 3-4-3): Mendy; Azpilicueta, Silva, Rudiger; James, Jorginho, Kovacic, Chilwell; Mount, Werner, Havertz.
(probable, 4-4-2): Marchesin; Manafa, Mbemba, Pepe, Sanusi; Corona, Uribe, Oliveira, Otavio; Taremi, Marega.