Champions League: The legend of Thomas TuChel

Veni Vidi Vici. Thomas Tuchel has conquered Europe. From the disappointment of losing the UEFA Champions League final with Paris St Germain last year to masterminding an impressive run to the title with Chelsea this year, the German manager has proved that he is more than a guy who lucked out in Europe’s so-called farmers’ leagues (French and German leagues). He is a tactical genius who outwitted arguably the world’s best manager, Pep Guardiola, in the final against Manchester City.

Having been sacked by PSG on Christmas Eve 2020—he fell out with the club’s sporting director—it took him only a month to land at another top club. But the situation was far from ideal at Chelsea. Club legend Frank Lampard had been dismissed from the position of head coach after a disappointing start to the season. The squad had enviable talent and depth, but Lampard found it hard to deal with the influx of big signings last summer. Chelsea sat at ninth on the league table and seemed in bad shape to take on La Liga leaders Atletico Madrid in the Champions League round of 16.

Tuchel was an obvious choice, though he was hesitant to join a club mid-season. He was a favourite for the job for a few reasons. His reputation of getting the best out of star players; his 15 years of experience as a manager (not too young, not too old); his ability to read games and situations; and most of all to get Timo Werner, Kai Havertz and Christian Pulisic—young guns from the Bundesliga—firing once again.

There was instant impact. On arrival, he immediately shuffled the team and its tactics. The biggest change was to shift to a three-man central defence, with flying wingbacks, to stop the leaking of goals. This meant reinstating club captain Cesar Azpilicueta into the main team to lead the trio after he lost his position in right back to the young Reece James under Lampard. The result? 19 clean sheets in Tuchel’s 30 games in charge, including one in the Champions League final.

He made Chelsea history by being the first manager to go unbeaten in his first 13 games in charge. That 13th game was a victory against Atletico in the second leg of their UCL clash, which takes Chelsea into the quarterfinals. He scripted victories against the world’s best managers—Guardiola, Jose Mourinho, Zinedine Zidane, Jurgen Klopp, Diego Simeone and Carlo Ancelotti. His team conceded just two goals in nine games against these managers.

Tuchel’s biggest weapon was his ability to shape-shift, making it difficult for opposition managers to read his methods. In his first ten EPL games, he made a total of 39 changes to the starting lineups. It is said that he started plotting and planning his approach on his first flight to London to accept the job. He formulated a blueprint to extract the best out of a squad he inherited, that was low on morale and looked disjointed.

To his benefit, he was handed one of the most talented bunch of footballers in Europe. And the credit for that rightly goes to his predecessor Lampard for grooming a crop of Chelsea youth players and to the duo of Chelsea executive director Marina Granovskaia and technical advisor Petr Cech for the new signings. But under Lampard, the sum of the parts was greater than the whole.

The old argument of “anybody could have won it with a team this talented” proved to be an incorrect assumption yet again. Lampard’s inexperience and inability to read the game proved costly for him. Given his aptitude, he is certain to reach incredible heights as a manager. But these Chelsea players needed an experienced boss to stitch together a winning side, not a young man learning the ropes. Despite Lampard’s excellent working relationship with Cech, Granovskaia and owner Roman Abramovich, he was not ready to take the club to new heights.

The same relationship cannot be expected of Tuchel. At each of his last two jobs—PSG and Borussia Dortmund—he had bitter public spats with the club authorities above him, and he carries an ego the size of a blue whale. When bad times come—and they will come—the current boss and an equally volatile Chelsea owner will have to find ways to avoid conflict. Perhaps the mild-mannered and astute Petr Cech will have to mediate between the two and ensure both men get the players and results that they will demand.

The first task will be to get Tuchel to extend his interim contract. And, there is work to do this summer. The first big puzzle that the German will have to solve is the short supply of goals. In his time so far, Chelsea has averaged a measly 1.2 goals a game. Tuchel’s PSG averaged 2.7 gpg and his Dortmund scored at the rate of 2.4 gpg. Rumours of in-form Romelu Lukaku returning to Stamford Bridge are already doing the rounds, and it is going to be an interesting summer for the club when Tuchel can plug the gaps with players of his choosing.

As the season ends, it is worth noting Chelsea’s successful year is a collection of stories. Of Edouard Mendy who was without a job seven years ago; of N’Golo Kante who is in the running for the Ballon d’Or; of the club-record signing Kai Havertz scoring the only goal in the UCL final; and of youth product Mason Mount who is the club’s player of the season. Tuchel’s story of redemption and long-denied recognition fits in perfectly. If Chelsea’s 2012 UCL victory was a fluke, Tuchel ensured that the 2021 one was anything but.