Mason Mount has been speaking this week alongside Blues Women's star Fran Kirby, and the topic of Thomas Tuchel inevitably came up in the conversation.
Mount played his first game of the Graham Potter era in the midweek RB Salzburg draw. It was safe to say that the Blues' number 19 arguably had his best game of the season, which wasn't hard, considering the underwhelming start to 2022/23 under Tuchel's guidance.
The 23-year-old was one of the last players to speak after the Dinamo Zagreb loss, in the very last hours before Todd Boehly made the ruthless decision to part ways the next morning.
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On the topic of 'underestimating' the Croatian outfit, Tuchel was adamant at the time that he personally didn't take this stance, while he didn't confirm that his players saw it the same way. Something the Three Lions international disputed at the time. He said post-match on BT Sport: "No, we never underestimate anyone. This is the Champions League, and they are here for a reason. Tough place to come. You see the crowd the whole game, but I feel like the way we played and the way we started the game, we should have killed it off at the beginning.
"Take our chances, score some goals, and the game is done. We let them kind of feel that they are still in the game, and once they get that goal, it's very difficult to get back into it, so they have obviously done what they came to do tonight, what they plan to do, and we need to look at ourselves because it is not good enough.
"We are a team that bounces back, we are strong, and we use this as a moment in time where we get together and look at how we get out of this form."
With the German now gone, the supporters, alongside some of the players, were shocked in a bad way about the decision made by Roman Abramovich's successor at such an early period of the season.
Tuchel himself and his assistants have broken their own silences on the situation. However, in an interview with The Times, the FAWSL current Champions' star Kirby has been the latest to laud the qualities that Potter's predecessor had In abundance.
Speaking alongside Mount in an interview about the Lionesses and other topic matters, she said: "The passion he shows and the way he celebrates every goal exactly the same, you need a manager like that.
"I've worked with Emma now for eight years, and to see her evolve and be given that time to gel, make a team. Tuchel came in and won the biggest prize you could win at club football straight away [the Champions League last year]. How do you even beat something like that? The expectation is always here," she says, raising her hand high in the air.
"But he always shows incredible passion for the club and the trust he has in his players: He doesn't give up on players too easily, and if someone has a bad game, it's not like you're getting shafted now. He lets them build and grow and it's important a player gets that trust from a manager."
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