As Manchester United held the Blues to yet another stalemate at Stamford Bridge, with neither of the teams able to break the deadlock, Tuchel extended his unbeaten run to nine games across all competitions.
He made several changes to the starting eleven that took on Atletico Madrid in the UEFA Champions League last 16 1st leg – with the likes of N’Golo Kante, Ben Chilwell and Hakim Ziyech all stealing a starting spot ahead of Jorginho, Marcos Alonso and Timo Werner.
However, Tammy Abraham’s absence from the match day squad was less spoken of as Olivier Giroud started his second game in the space of 4 days, after putting in a winning display against Atletico with a brilliant goal in Romania.
After the 0-0 stalemate, Tuchel spoke of the Abraham’s absence, in quotes picked up by football.london he said:
“We have 21 strong players and only 18 possible and so these are hard decisions, it’s my job to take hard decisions. This is what you sign up for when you play for Chelsea. Tammy was not with the group.”
Adding further, Tuchel extended his full support to the youngster:
“He is not struggling. We have a strong squad with only Thiago Silva injured. We had Oli starting, we had Kai also on the bench. Things might be difficult for him at this stage, as they should be, but he has our support.”
Chelsea failed to enter the top four and go one point ahead of West Ham United after the draw.
