Chelsea manager Thomas Tuchel was pleased to see his side manage a 2-0 win over Sheffield United in their FA Cup quarter-final on Sunday, but believes a number of errors were due to tiredness.
Speaking to the BBC after the match, his 10th win in 14 games as manager since replacing Frank Lampard, he said: “Sounds excellent to say we’re through to the semi-finals – it was a tough match. We had a good first half where we controlled everything. We lost control in the second half, we were clearly tired.
“After 14 consecutive matches I could feel we were tired and we made many little faults. We were lucky to keep the clean sheet in the second half but I think it’s the first time in the 14 games we have looked tired. It’s important to go through in the cup and that was the target and we reached it.”
An Oliver Norwood own goal put Chelsea ahead after 24 minutes, but Sheffield United came back into the game before Hakim Ziyech’s late second. Tuchel acknowledged the game was in the balance for some time.
“We let them come back because we had full control in the first half, and second half a big chance with Christian Pulisic to finish the game early.” he said.
“We made too many easy mistakes and lost duels and lost some momentum.
“I could tell in training we were tired and there was a lack of concentration. That can happen sometimes it gets harder to keep the level up – I’m happy we could help from the bench and in the end we have the win so we take that.”
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