Chelsea will be without Romelu Lukaku and Timo Werner for their clash with Norwich this weekend, and going forward, and manager Thomas Tuchel has challenged Mason Mount and Kai Havertz
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Thomas Tuchel has challenged Mason Mount and Kai Havertz to take a “big opportunity” to kick start their seasons.
Chelsea forwards Romelu Lukaku and Timo Werner are both facing a spell on the sidelines through injury and the likes of Mount and Havertz will have to fill the void with goals.
England star Mount has yet to score for club or country this season while Havertz has managed just one goal in the Premier League after losing his automatic starting place.
Blues boss Tuchel said: “It’s a big opportunity for the guys because Romelu gets a lot of minutes, Timo gets a lot of minutes. Now is the moment to step up, it’s as simple as that.
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“This is what they are waiting for, this is game time, now they have the responsibility, more than maybe they felt it until today and here we go. Now they have to show.
“They have our trust, our support and it’s up to them. It’s a big opportunity, not a little bit of an opportunity.
“This is our squad, we need to find solutions because we have some injuries but still we will have a strong squad on the pitch who can score and absolutely be able to put themselves in the position to win this game.”
USA star Christian Pulisic is also still out with an ankle injury and that could open the door for Callum Hudson-Odoi but Tuchel made it very clear that the England winger has a lot to do to prove himself.
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When asked whether it could be a turning point for Hudson-Odoi’s stop-start career, Tuchel said: “The only person who can decide this and answer this question is Callum. It’s as easy as that. Is there a turning point? Okay, he needs to prove it.
“He needs to play the next 250 games on the highest level and then that was the turning point. But is it a turning point if he does a brilliant match tomorrow? No.
“It’s only a turning point if he makes it a turning point and a turning point is only if he does not only do one good match, one good half, 60 good minutes, but if he does it consistently. It’s as easy as that with every player.”
Meanwhile, Tuchel confessed he fell into a “trap” this week when appearing to talk about Borussia Dortmund’s sought after striker Erling Haaland and the possibility of him even partnering Lukaku for Chelsea.
Tuchel said: “I fell into a trap. I got an award in Germany. I got an award from a newspaper. They gave me this award and asked me about a player. Normally I never, never speak about other players, because I simply never do.
“Instead of saying: ‘no I don’t want to answer a question.’ I joked about a double striker with Romelu in October and it gets like we put an offer in. That was the context, but I should have known better.”