BEVERLY HILLS, March 18, (THEWILL) – For advancing in this season’s UEFA Champions League competition, the English Premier League club Chelsea’s 1-0 win at the Wanda Metropolitano Stadium three weeks ago put them in pole position to progress in place of La Liga leaders Atletico Madrid.
However, a cursory view of historical antecedents and the fickle nature of football predictions, showed it was anybody’s game.
La Liga-leading Diego Simeone’s Atletico, even though they were currently experiencing a dip in quality, always progressed from 50 per cent of the European Cup and Champions League knockout ties in which they had previously lost the first leg.
Yet, in the entire history of Chelsea’s participation in European competition they had never been eliminated in a two-leg knockout tie after winning the first leg away from home. Besides, Thomas Tuchel’s impregnable team was not one to change that record now.
That was the setting heading into Wednesday’s hotly-contested last 16 tie from which one team was to emerge. At the other end of the fixture, it was Tuchel’s Chelsea that cruised into the Champions League quarter-finals after seeing off Atletico Madrid with ease, with a masterful counter-attack Ziyech goal and a late Emerson strike.
The quality on display from the London club was beautiful to watch especially against an opponent such as Simeone’s Atletico that Tuchel felt comfortable enough to boast that Europe’s elite will want to avoid Chelsea in Friday’s Champions League draw for the next round.
That boast can be understood in perspective. Since Gary Megson’s Bolton Wanderers knocked out the Madrid club in the last 32 2007/2008 of the UEFA Cup, no English side had been able to eliminate Atleti from the knockout stage of a major European competition. Plus, prior to Wednesday’s loss, Atletico had never lost both legs of a two-legged knockout tie in the European Cup/Champions League previously.
Yet, as confirmed several times by THEWILL, Chelsea’s new Tuchel backline and improved defensive midfield wall are forces of nature that cannot be penetrated. And, on the night, they were excellent.
This is what allows Tuchel the audacity to claim of his defense: “They play with a special bond and that gives you an edge. I’m sure no one will want to play against us and there’s no need for us to be afraid.”
He cannot be more accurate. In goal, the Senegalese Edouard Mendy is loving life under Thomas Tuchel thanks to Chelsea’s renewed focus on defensive solidity which has helped him chalk up numbers of clean sheet performances with such uncanny regularity. He has kept 14 clean sheets in his 24 Premier League appearances for the Blues this season, conceding just 16 goals in all.
Before meeting La Liga’s leading club, the Blues had kept clean sheets in 10 of Tuchel’s 12 games in charge of the club. This contrasts sharply with the more porous defensive displays that had been seen in the final days of Frank Lampard’s time in London as head coach.
When they beat Simeone’s side, they took that record to 11 in 13, an illustration of the advantage of Tuchel’s decision to focus on shoring up the Blues’ defence in order to make the side harder to beat this season. That objective has been attained. The theory now is that the German coach will, next season, subsequently engage in a process aimed at improving his side’s striking capacities while playing more expansive football.
So far, Thomas Tuchel has not lost a game. Chelsea have won nine and drawn four in all competitions under the 47-year-old tactician. They have moved up into the top four in the EPL, have reached the quarterfinals of the FA Cup, and, after last night, are into the quarterfinals on Europe for the first time since 2013/2014 with the German’s shepherding.
Scoring goals has been the only drawback as the manager continues to rewrite some of Chelsea’s record books. His 10-match unbeaten start to Premier League life is the second best in the club’s history, behind Maurizio Sarri’s 12-match start in the 2018/2019 season. Plus, his 13-match unbeaten start in all competitions is second best to Sarri’s 18-match run.
Yet, it is most impressive that Tuchel is getting all these records as a mid-season appointment, whilst relying on a fair number of younger and still-acclimatising players, rather than just experience or established habits and well-worn patterns, in his first foray into the tough terrain of the EPL top dogs fight. When he gets the players to bang in the goals, they will be a hard side to beat, though Tuchel already claims they are.
For Simeone’s Atletico, there is the harsh reality of another European exit to deal with. Some fans will have some complaints about the refereeing, but the truth is that they were outplayed over the course of the two ties. And Stefan Savic’s late dismissal for an idiotic elbow on Antonio Rudiger compounded Atletico’s misery.
All that is left for them to focus on is making sure they take La Liga Santander, where they have a four-point lead over Barcelona, in second place.
Simeone was facing the reality of their season when, in his post-match remarks, noted: “I’m not looking for excuses. They were better. When the rival is better, you have to congratulate and reset yourself to think about La Liga again.”
It was Atletico who knocked Chelsea out of the Champions League last time they made it beyond the last 16, defeating the Blues in the semi-finals in 2014. However, Tuchel’s in-form team gained revenge with a consummate performance.
