THOMAS TUCHEL ADMITTED empathising with the Chelsea supporter who confronted captain Cesar Azpilicueta after the Blues’ 4-2 Premier League loss to Arsenal.
A Blues fan was caught in a heated exchange with Azpilicueta in the wake of Chelsea’s Stamford Bridge humbling on Wednesday night, with the home skipper appearing to give as good as he got.
Eddie Nketiah’s first-ever Arsenal brace, Bukayo Saka’s penalty and a neat Emile Smith Rowe finish picked apart a sloppy Chelsea.
Chelsea have now leaked 11 goals in their last three matches at Stamford Bridge, leaving an unimpressed Tuchel refusing to defend his players.
Asked about Azpilicueta’s exchange with the supporter, Tuchel replied: “I was not part of it, I saw it, but, honestly, I can also understand the fan.
“It was a totally wild and open game in the first half, already at 2-2 after we came back twice.
“We had a good start but again gave the first goal away, which is impossible to do these things in consecutive matches. But we’re doing it.
“We came back twice and we scored another two in the second half, unfortunately for the wrong side.
“It’s a level of mistakes, the number of mistakes in consecutive games here at home, it’s impossible at this kind of level. You don’t see this.
“It’s simply impossible, but we’re doing this at the moment and you cannot win football games like this.
“It’s not about individual players. A defensive performance is a team performance and an offensive performance is a team performance.
“You need to have the tactics right, which is doubtful I had this right, and you need the team selection right, again it’s doubtful I had this right.
“Then it’s a game for the players. They get full praise when they do it, when they did it for the last three matches.
“And they have to face the reality that it’s impossible to win matches if you make this amount of mistakes of this calibre. It’s simply impossible. I don’t see it in any other matches but I see it now in consecutive matches of our games and it has to stop.”
England forward Saka blasted the late penalty to seal just Arsenal’s second win in six Premier League matches.
The victory puts the Gunners right back in the race for a top-four finish, drawing Mikel Arteta’s side level on points with fourth-placed Tottenham.
Saka banished the demons from his Euro 2020 final shoot-out miss, by converting his first spot-kick for the Gunners.
Arteta revealed Gabriel Martinelli was expected to take the penalty, but he hailed Saka for holding his nerve.
“I thought Gaby was going to take it, when I saw that Bukayo took it, honestly, my first thing was that he was back in the summer and what happened,” said Arteta.
“When that happened to Bukayo that happened for a reason, and he has come back so strongly since.
“But for him to have the courage to say ‘I’m going to take it again’, it must have been in the back of his mind. It was strong for him to say ‘I’m going to do it’.
“I said to the players, if you want to be playing Champions League football, you have to go these stadiums and beat the top teams.
“So they have done it and I’m really proud of them, but I’m more proud of how we’ve reacted as a group in the past weeks. That gives me more energy to be here.”
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