Thomas Tuchel acknowledges that his Chelsea side cannot afford the blips in form they suffer if they hope to compete with Manchester City and Liverpool for the Premier League title in the future. The title-challengers have distanced themselves at the top of the table to leave the Blues 13 points behind the second-placed Reds and 14 behind the Citizens. To be competitive, Tuchel has acknowledged that is difficult to make comparisons with their rivals, but highlighted that it wasn’t long ago Liverpool were also battling difficult periods.
Thomas Tuchel said: “Not this season. Liverpool had last season these moments like when they lost Van Dijk. But in general, this is the gap I’m talking about and what we need to close. It is tough because you compare yourself with maybe the best two teams that ever played in the Premier League in terms of consistency. When you compare yourself, you can get frustrated and maybe feel less strong than you actually are. But on the other side, there is something to close. There is something that it seems does not happen to these two teams like it can happen to us. The first point is to admit it. The second point is not to get frustrated about it and work on it with a daily process and take your lessons out of it.”
Tuchel hopes to see a more energetic performance from his Chelsea side against Southampton at St Mary’s to help overcome any malaise that has set in during defeats to Brentford and Real Madrid. The 48-year-old wants his side to wake up for the clash and provide more intensity on both sides of the ball.
Thomas Tuchel said: “I’m tempted to say yes we need to wake up but not that they did it consciously. Somehow after international break we had the feeling like we play with 80, 90 percent and we hope to get away with it and it is not like this. Maybe it is the future of the sport and we play the two wrong opponents at the wrong time. There are a lot of reasons which can be reasons that you feel exhausted, that you are exhausted. You have the feeling ‘I cannot reach my 100 per cent’. But you need to, you need to overcome it. There is no other way and we need to kind of wake up or remind ourselves again that the investment physically was not enough in the last two matches and we need to find work over the pitch that doesn’t matter so much if you find it on the ball or off the ball but we need to find high intensity work again, because this is what we do and this is what we lacked in the last two matches.”
