Thomas Tuchel says Chelsea have too many players who aren’t committed after suffering a shock 4-0 defeat to Arsenal – meaning they won’t likely be ready for the start of the season.
The Blues have only offloaded Romelu Lukaku this summer and have several other players with question marks over their future.
Speaking from the Camping World Stadium in Orlando, the Blues boss spoke about his concerns going into the new season.
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Tuchel:
“I’m far from relaxed. I think we deserved to lose – which is fair enough – because we were simply not good enough.”
“We were absolutely not competitive. The worrying part is the level of commitment,
physically and mentally, for this match was not the same, it was far higher for Arsenal than us.
“We can argue they played with I think their strongest line-up;
they’ve had now together several weeks and for more than one year.
They’ve strengthened their line-up, played the same structure, and this is the line-up they’ll try to start Premier League games.
“It was not our strongest lineup and this is part of an explanation but only a little part.
The other part is worrying. I can not guarantee [we will be ready for next season].
“I saw today a team in Arsenal who are mentally committed to an idea of playing, a level of exhaustion, a level of physical commitment that we could not match.
“Also, a level of mental commitment that we lacked because we have a lot of players who are thinking about leaving and looking at their options.
We have players that have left and I think at the moment that’s obvious.
He adds:
“Unfortunately, it proved my point and the last week proves my point [about the need for new signings].
I would prefer to not be right and I did everything to prove myself wrong,
but at the moment I feel I was right when I look at the last season and at the parts of the game where we struggled and how we struggled.
“We got sanctioned and players left us, we know that some players are trying to leave us, and this is where it is.
We had an urgent appeal for quality players and a huge amount of quality players.
We’ve got two quality players – that is no doubt – but we are not competitive like this and unfortunately, we could see it today.”
Timo Werner, Cesar Azpilicueta and Marcos Alonso are among players with questions over his future.
However, Kalidou Koulibaly made his debut and was one of the better performers.
“He was the best player on the pitch for us,” he continued. “On an evening where nothing felt good, this felt very good.”
Tuchel and his squad have an overnight flight to the UK and will restart training at Cobham on Tuesday.
He will likely be working on that journey back to London with work to do on fixing his side.
“We fly home now and we have one-and-a-half days only, on Tuesday we need to present solutions, we need to present actions,” he continued.
“Me and the coaching staff, together with the team, need to step up and find a way through this because it hurts at the moment.”
