Tuchel: The lights affected Jorginho and I went with my gut to play Werner
By Paul Lagan at Stamford Bridge
Thomas Tuchel took a gut decision to play Timo Werner and it backfired on him as the Blues squandered numerous chances to put visitors Manchester United to the sword as the league leaders could only draw 1-1 at Stamford Bridge.
The German head coach remains calm and collected at all times off the pitch, but on it, he is as volatile as an exploding volcano.
While he was frustrated as not scoring more goals, he was protective of Jorginho and Werner.
The former gifted United their goal, the later looked out of sorts and never looked like scoring.
The Brazil-born Italian mis-controlled a high ball on 50 minutes and Jadon Sancho took full advantage to score.
Tuchel said: “It was an unusual mistake from Jorginho and to concede a goal like this in general.
He misjudged the situation but was heavily disturbed by the lights and could not see the ball.
“It took a lot of courage and personality not to be affected and I’m very happy he took the penalty.”
That successful penalty ensured the Blues remain top of the Premier League but had they taken their chances, they could and should have run away with all three points.
On misfiring Werner, Tuchel should perhaps have utilised his highly prized coaching certificates and not his instinct.
He said: “Timo Werner has not played for a long time (following an injury), so how can we expect him to play at his absolute peak?
“He looked very sharp in training, and scored many goals in the last few training sessions.
Thats why I went with my gut and put him on the pitch and hoped that he could hurt the two central defenders.
“And this was a decision for Timo as he looked really sharp against Juventus and scored a goal and we thought he could be a big threat in the middle.”
Chelsea are away to relegation- threatened Watford on Wednesday in the league and will almost certainly start with hit-man Romelu Lukaku who started the game on the bench, but had a cameo role.
But there won’t be wholesale changes.
Tuchel was by and large happy with his players.
He said: “We are disappointed with the result. It does not feel good when it’s happens.
But I’m happy with the performance.
“I’m happy with the courage, will and ambition of this team. It’s a hungry team.
“They are exciting to coach and watch.
“We try hard to get the reward for the chances we took. We had huge amounts of shots.
We could maybe have created more chances with the ball.”
The calm off the pitch Tuchel was replaced by the incandescent Tuchel in the dugout and he entered referee Anthony Taylor’s little black book having responded badly to an offside that allowed United to continue an attack and create a chance from the resultant corner.
He said: “In the end I’m the guy who gets the yellow card.
Everyone tells me it was a clear offside and then we have to defend a dangerous corner. And the second ball from the set piece.
It was a terrible decision.”
