Romelu Lukaku (28) has struggled to adjust to his return to Chelsea in August. Now both coach and experts are defending him.
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It was in Saturday’s league match away against Crystal Palace that the star striker set an unwanted record with only seven ball touches during 90 minutes of play. Before the break, he was close to the ball only twice – one of them by kick-off, according to the analysis tool Opta. This is the lowest number Opta has registered since they started with such Premier League polls in the 2003/04 season, wrote The Sun.
At the press conference for tonight’s Champions League quarter-final against Lille, manager Thomas Tuchel defended the Belgian.
– Sometimes it is only with strikers that they struggle a little with low self-esteem and to find the openings where they can get to goal chances against defensively good teams. It’s not how we want it to be, but this is not the time to laugh at him or make jokes, said the German.
He also added that Chelsea have a recent history with strikers who for some reason do not quite make it to the London club. Fernando Torres, Andrij Shevchenko and Álvaro Morata were names mentioned.
The Belgian Lukaku was transferred for 97.5 million pounds from Inter this summer where in two years and 72 games he scored 47 goals. In Chelsea, he has been somewhat injured and stands with only five goals in his 17 games.
Former England international Gary Lineker is the host of the popular BBC show Match of the Day on Saturdays. He supported Lukaku after the Belgium striker’s unimpressive Saturday match by insisting that it was up to his teammates to pull the finisher into the matches.
– When I was active and saw little of the ball or was rarely lined with passes in the field, I could yell something serious at my teammates, stated Lineker.
Former Manchester United defender Rio Ferdinand has lashed out at him, saying “he would be crazy if he was in Lukaku’s place and didn’t get balls to work with.” Ferdinand further criticizes Tuchel for apparently not yet knowing how to make the best use of Lukaku’s abilities.
VGs tips: Chelsea – Lille
* All the noise around Lukaku’s failure of form may mean that the Belgian gets a rest. The matches are coming close now, and it is after all a league cup final on the program on Sunday. Chelsea have won five games in a row in all contexts and are recent champions of the World Cup for club teams in Abu Dhabi.
* French Little take some advantage of one day more recovery as they played Ligue 1 on Friday. But overall, the season has been a big disappointment for last year’s Ligue 1 champion. They are below the middle of the table and have a negative goal difference in their 25 matches. Friday’s home game against bottom team Metz ended 0-0.
See more statistics for the Champions League on VG Live.–
