New boss admits Werner needs goal
THOMAS TUCHEL has admitted Timo Werner needs to break his scoring duck to restore his dented confidence with Chelsea.
Defenders Cesar Azpilicueta and Marcos Alonso rifled fine goals to show mis-firing £53 million striker Werner the way as Chelsea saw off Burnley 2-0 at Stamford Bridge.
The Blues sealed just a third Premier League win in 10 matches, moved up to seventh in the table and handed new boss Tuchel his first win at the second time of asking.
RB Leipzig summer recruit Werner’s misery extended to a return of just one goal in 17 matches in all competitions however, leaving Tuchel again to defend the 24-year-old.
“He’s totally into it, he gives everything, but every striker is sensitive and nothing helps them more than goals,” said Tuchel. “If they miss goals for a certain amount of time it’s the same for all of them. So this is nothing special for Timo, it happens to every striker in the world. As long as he has the impact and tries everything, like he did today, we will support him.
“We also missed some chances to use him in counter-attacks, which is his strength to use him with his speed. So we have to use him in the right way also.”
Elsewhere, Leicester boss Brendan Rodgers admitted his side felt the absence of Jamie
Vardy and Wilfred Ndidi as the Foxes slipped to a 3-1 defeat against Leeds.
However, Rodgers is confident of signing a midfielder before tonight’s transfer deadline and addressing that lack of strength in depth in his squad.
With top scorer Vardy missing a second match as he recovers from hernia surgery and Ndidi absent after suffering a slight hamstring tear, Leicester lacked physicality, by Rodgers’ own admission.
They led through Harvey Barnes’ strike but an immediate reply from Stuart Dallas and second-half goals from Patrick Bamford and Jack Harrison sealed victory for Leeds.
“I think we’ve been on a fantastic run and it was always going to come to an end at some point. We weren’t quite ourselves today, but you also have
to give Leeds credit and they deserved to win,” said Rodgers.
“I think you could see that there were certain moments where we missed those two players [Vardy and Ndidi], they are quality for us. There were areas we needed more physicality.
“When they are not available we have to find other ways to cope with that and throughout the season we have done that and found ways to get results. Today, we could have defended better, we gave away poor goals and we didn’t take our chances.”
In the late game, Brighton registered an overdue first Premier League home win by seeing off an out-of-sorts Tottenham who were missing Harry Kane. Leandro Trossard gave the relegation-threatened Seagulls a major boost in the scrap for survival by ending his 19-game goal drought to earn a 1-0 success.