Chelsea’s loss to Juventus on Wednesday despite big possession in the UEFA Champions League was down to “a shooting problem,” says manager Thomas Tuchel.
“If we don’t shoot, they cannot be on target,” Tuchel said following the 1-0 defeat. “If you play against a deep block like today, it’s hard to take shots. We found the spaces, it wasn’t easy. We had a lot of shots, but I think there are some chances late in the game where it wouldn’t have been so hard to find the target.”
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Chelsea had 73 percent of the ball and took 16 of the game’s 22 shots but there was only one save in the game and that came from Juve’s Wojciech Szczesny.
Tuchel compared the loss and its lack of breaks to Man City’s defeat of the Blues in Premier League play at the weekend.
“Manchester City scored from a set-piece with a deflected shot against us. Sometimes you need this. If a team defends deep, it’s hard to find your own rhythm. We were lacking runners. Once we started to do other things, we made mistakes and that cost us a bit of belief.”
FEDERICO CHIESA. 11 SECONDS INTO THE SECOND HALF. 💥 pic.twitter.com/W3KkSWJE37
— CBS Sports Golazo ⚽️ (@CBSSportsGolazo) September 29, 2021
He’s not wrong.
Still, Juventus scorer Federico Chiesa had a different take.
“It was a hard-fought performance, because Chelsea pinned us back and did really well in possession, but this evening we showed what the Juve spirit is all about, the spirit that the coach asks for,” Chiesa told Amazon Prime Italia. “We started out with a system, then the coach changed so we could attack the space, where Chelsea were struggling this evening, and we did well to punish them.”
Chelsea will host Southampton on Saturday before the international break, returning to PL action with an Oct. 16 visit to Brentford.
