The mantra that attack wins you games but defence wins you titles is cliche but still seems to ring true. Having a solid base for Thomas Tuchel was his first step as Chelsea manager and now he has found himself without two of his Champions League winning backline it's time for change.
The search for new defensive reinforcements has dominated Todd Boehly's summer so far as the club look for apt replacements for Andreas Christensen and Antonio Rudiger.
Kalidou Koulibaly has already been purchased and the 31-year-old experienced defender will add great quality and leadership to Chelsea's backline next season, be it in a four man or five man system.
READ MORE: Chelsea have £60m Cesar Azpilicueta replacement as Thomas Tuchel builds dream defence
The Senegalese centre back has been one of Europe's top performers since his move to Napoli in 2014 and was even looked at by Manchester City before they signed Ruben Dias.
Tuchel has his hands on his new man now though and former Manchester United defender Mikael Silvestre is backing him to have a huge impact in London. “It’s a good signing for Chelsea. He’s top class," said the four time Premier League champion, speaking to Lord Ping.
“He’s going to bring power and when you lose Rudiger and Christensen, I don’t think there was a lot of better options than him as he has balance, consistency and he could help them challenge for the title.”
Silvestre was part of the United side that were challenging Arsenal's invincibles and Jose Mourinho's Chelsea in the early 2000s and he knows about true title fights. This is a similar situation to how Tuchel finds his current Blues team attempting to close the gap on the runaway leaders of Man City and Liverpool over the past five years.
Tuchel has already expressed his desired to see Koulibaly raise the quality of his defence: "It's nice he [Kouliably] takes the challenge right now and we have Thiago Silva, who is even older and super experienced and still at the peak of his game. We hope Kalidou can do the same and play for many years for us.
"He is totally fit and ready for the challenge and he needs to be because we need him in top shape."
The German is still hoping to add to his centre back options for next season having already seen talks with Pep Guardiola's side for Nathan Ake stop and Matthijs De Ligt preferring a move to Germany with Bayern Munich. Jules Kounde had been a deal which was thought as being extremely close to completion but Barcelona's late surge has put that jeopardy.
If Tuchel does have to look elsewhere from Kounde then he will still know that he has a great tutor for youngster Levi Colwill or Ethan Ampadu who are both attempting to impress during preseason.
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