Thomas Tuchel’s £112m Chelsea transfer request will help replicate Man City £306m gold standard – Anita Abayomi

Thomas Tuchel’s defensive model works, but Pep Guardiola’s works much better.

I’m not talking about Manchester City’s style of fluid attacking play, I’m referring to their £306m backline.

Chelsea has spent near the same amount of money on their attack and it just doesn’t seem to have paid off. We can only look to the Premier League leaders to figure out exactly what it is we’re missing.

A star-studded defence has kept Manchester City ticking. Yes, they have the beautiful football and the manager to match, but the beginning of every attack comes from their defence. Something Chelsea could look into before spending more money on an already bulked-up attack.

Over the years, Man City have built up a menacing squad. Despite their consistent run at success, Pep Guardiola continued to build his team season by season focusing on the defensive personnel.

So far into Guardiola’s six-year reign, they have bought Joao Cancelo, Ruben Dias, John Stones, Nathan Ake, Kyle Walker, Oleksandr Zinchenko among others. The Spaniard finally seems to be content with his backline having added the brilliant Dias to the equation last season.

In the time that Manchester City bought all of these defenders, Chelsea has only spent money on three. Antonio Rudiger, Ben Chilwell and Malang Sarr.

Thomas Tuchel’s arrival helped several fans forget about Chelsea’s previous defensive woes. The Blues struggled to keep the ball out of their net under ex-boss Frank Lampard and were not so steady under Maurizio Sarri. We’re now seeing the same pattern that we saw with Antonio Conte.

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Chelsea lacked defensively at the beginning of Conte’s reign, however, following a 3-1 loss and a rude awakening from their London rivals Arsenal, the 3-4-3 system was born.

There are many reasons to use a three at the back system. I’m sure Thomas Tuchel executes all the advantages that a 3-4-3 can have. The main reason known to many is to cover up defensive flaws in the backline, and it did just that when Tuchel arrived.

Upon the German’s arrival, Chelsea instantly reverted to a 3-4-3. There was no time to test the theory, the aim was to secure the defence and fix the rest later. Considering that Tuchel’s system kept 19 clean sheets in 25 matches, there is probably no need to consider new options for the defence. Right? Wrong.

We cannot mask the fact that Chelsea has now conceded 18 goals since December 2021. There is an outcry for the Blues to rejuvenate their attack, but really, it is the defence that might just need some new legs. With Antonio Rudiger’s contract negotiations looking more positive than ever, Cesar Azpilicueta and Andreas Christensen look to be on their way out.

It’s not such a bad idea to let them go. Jules Kounde, Matthijs De Ligt should be the first transfers on our list. £112 million market value for the defensive duo. Followed by two new fullbacks. Aurelien Tchouameni and Declan Rice are the next priority on the list. Attackers need to be considered last, despite the endless frustrations over the lack of output.

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