Thomas Tuchel has criticised his Chelsea players for their passing and distribution as they failed to get Romelu Lukaku into the game against Manchester City.
The two Premier League giants faced off in an early kick-off on Saturday and it was City who left Stamford Bridge with all three points.
A Gabriel Jesus goal was the only difference between the teams and put an end to Chelsea’s unbeaten start to the season, much to the frustration of Tuchel.
The Blues boss felt his side lacked belief in their play and were ineffective in their attempts to get their danger man Lukaku involved.
(Image: PA)
After the match he told BT Sport: “We lost the game and I think City deserved to win, I think for 60 minutes or until the goal, we were very strong in the last 20 metres of the field and only there.
“There were 80 metres where we were not good enough and could not escape the pressure.
“We tried to adapt our system so that helped us a little bit, then we conceded a goal from a set play.
“If we wanted to go for long balls to Romelu they were not precise enough. I did not feel the belief that we can really escape with short balls.
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“I did not think that if we play long balls we believed in it, it was doubtful and we were a little bit protecting something.
“It felt like there was something to lose but we had a lot to win, it can happen and we lacked a bit of freshness also.
“N’Golo [Kante] has been ill since some days and I decided to let him start, Jorginho had some problems, Thiago [Silva] could not start maybe this is on me, not the very best choices.”
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Chelsea could’ve made a huge statement by beating the reigning champions but instead now find themselves level on points with them after both have played six games.
Lukaku has been a menace for defenders since his return to the club from Inter Milan in the summer transfer window and has scored four times this season.
But the City centre-back duo of Aymeric Laporte and Ruben Dias contained him and prevented him from registering even a shot.