Chelsea boss Thomas Tuchel has revealed why snubbing Cesar Azpiliceuta for selection so far this season is one of the toughest decisions he has to make.
The Blues skipper completed 90 minutes against Everton on the first game of the season in the 1-0 victory but has not been named from the start in any of the three matches since.
Azpilicueta was brought on at half-time for 10 man Chelsea against Leicester City on Saturday and was impressive in the backline for Tuchel’s side.
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After penning a contract extension earlier this summer, Azpiluceta committed himself to Chelsea despite strong interest from Barcelona.
Despite his commitment to the club, he has not been rewarded with regular game time yet - the key selling point to a potential move to Spain.
Trevoh Chalobah was selected against Leicester as Kalidou Koulibaly served a suspension, with Azpilicueta once again named on the bench.
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However, Tuchel has now admitted how tough the decision to exclude Azpilicueta from his starting line-up the last three match days has been.
Speaking to the press ahead of Chelsea’s clash against Southampton, as quoted by football.london, Tuchel said:" At the moment, it is one of the toughest decisions because he trains so well and is in such good shape and status mentally.
“He is pushing everybody and is fully committed – it's what you want on the field.
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"But if we play 4-4-2, it's between him or Reece James. It's a luxury problem we have, but when we changed to a back five (against Leicester), we had the chance to have both of them on the pitch.
"Without tough decisions, we will get nowhere.
“We are used to competing for every title at Chelsea, competing at the highest level.
"If we don't have tough decisions, it will simply not happen.
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"We hope to have 60 matches, but to have 60 matches, we have to have a squad where everybody is ready to place and have a lot of difficult decisions.
"On Saturday, we ended up, more or less, in a situation where we had almost no more central defenders on the bench. Now we had N'Golo injured and Conor Gallagher with a yellow-red card.
“So there are not enough tough decisions at the moment. I would like to have more of these.
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"That would mean we are in full competition mode."
Topics: Chelsea, Cesar Azpilicueta, Thomas Tuchel, Football
Nick Emms