Was Thomas Tuchel to blame for Chelsea’s misfiring attack?

First, it’s important to get context as to why the attack has performed so poorly. Tuchel came in January 2021 when Chelsea wasn’t scoring enough goals but was leaking even more. The Blues were slipping down the table and were ninth. Tuchel’s first decision was to change Chelsea’s 4-3-3 formation under Frank Lampard to 3-4-3. He made some personnel changes too. He moved from a Kurt Zouma-Thiago Silva centerback partnership to an Antonio Rudiger-Thiago Silva-Cesar Azpilicueta partnership. He also paired Jorginho with Mateo Kovacic to form the pivot in the center of midfield. This left Reece James and Ben Chilwell to be wingbacks.

The former Paris Saint Germain gaffer deployed Hakim Ziyech, Olivier Giroud, and Kai Havertz in his first game as the front three in a narrow way. This made Ziyech and Havertz more dual central attacking midfielders than wingbacks. Ziyech did make another appearance for weeks, a decision which many justified by saying Ziyech didn’t fit the system Tuchel was trying to play. This was a reasonable explanation.

This was the case for several other forwards. Chelsea now had players that had made a name for themselves in a certain positions and roles but were now expected to be as effective but in completely different roles requiring different traits. This was the consequence of Tuchel’s formation change. By adding a centerback to the backline and putting a double pivot in front of them, he created a solid defensive base on which Chelsea could build. At the same time, it removed a player that could help Chelsea going forward. This was the gamble that Tuchel was faced with: deploy a system that optimizes your midfielders and defenders or deploy a system that optimizes your forwards. He decided to choose the former.