Football Match: Chelsea recaptured some of its flowing offensive styles in Tuesday’s 2-0 win against Lille in the first leg of their Champions League last-16 tie, but the focus at Stamford Bridge was on the strikers who did not play.
Record signing Romelu Lukaku was an unused replacement, but fellow strikers Kai Havertz and Christian Pulisic scored the goals that placed Chelsea in a commanding position to go to the quarter-finals.
Lukaku had the fewest touches of the ball in a Premier League game — seven — ever recorded by a player on the pitch for at least 90 minutes since such data began to be gathered in full in the 2003-04 season.
The Belgian’s role in Thomas Tuchel’s team, which has often looked more dangerous this season when Lukaku has been missing due to injury or COVID-19, has been questioned as a result of that unfavourable record.
Lukaku helped Inter Milan win the Serie A title last season with 24 league goals and 11 assists, and he’s off to a solid start in his second term at Stamford Bridge since moving to London in August.
In his first three Premier League games, he scored three goals and worked effectively with his teammates.
However, he has only scored two more goals in the league since then, and his comments in a television interview, in which he stated that Tuchel’s system did not suit him, further reinforced the feeling that Lukaku is not the ideal fit for Chelsea.
After the win against Lille, Tuchel informed reporters that he had determined Lukaku needed a rest after starting a streak of games recently.
“The focus was today on intensity, on a high-speed game and hard work off the ball,” the German coach said. “Romelu struggled in the last games to deliver that.”
Lukaku did score two of Chelsea’s three goals during the Club World Cup event in Abu Dhabi earlier this month, which the Londoners won.
However, Havertz’s threat and hard work rate during Tuesday’s rout of Lille suggested the German would get the nod ahead of the Belgian when Chelsea emerge from the tunnel at Wembley on Sunday for the League Cup final against Liverpool.
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