Are Chelsea fans starting to lose a bit of patience with their shiny new £97 million signing?
The Blues faced Graham Potter’s Brighton at the Amex Stadium on Tuesday night and, while Thomas Tuchel's side failed to pick up the three points, the Chelsea boss will have learnt a few things about his attack.
Hakim Ziyech broke the deadlock after 28 minutes before Adam Webster ensured his side grabbed themselves a point.
It took a moment of magic from Ziyech to score the first goal of the game and the question still remains: how can Chelsea get the best out of Romelu Lukaku without harming the team dynamic?
We’ve played Lukaku in a front two, a front three, we’ve used him as a target man and played him in a deeper role. Right now, it seems like Tuchel has tried just about everything he can with the Belgian.
Tuchel blamed his side's lacklustre performance on tiredness, however, there is more to it than meets the eye. After the Manchester City defeat at the weekend, Tuchel didn't hold back when asked about Lukaku’s performance.
“‘He had many ball losses without pressure and in very promising circumstances," Tuchel said. "Of course, we want to serve him but he is part of the team and sometimes he needs to do service as well."
In situations where Lukaku is expected to take matters into his own hands, it seldom happens. Ziyech did exactly that to open the scoring on the south coast and followed it up with an emotionless celebration.
Tensions were clearly running high between Ziyech and Lukaku. It seemed like they were in deep conversation trying to understand where they were going wrong in the first half, and the heated debate continued once the teams had emerged for the second half.
What I would have given to be a fly on the wall in that dressing room.
During his time at Inter Milan, Lukaku played at his best in a deeper role. As his partnership with Lautaro Martinez flourished, the pair were able to build a chemistry that a lot of fans were hoping to see replicated with Timo Werner. So far we've yet to see even a glimmer of such a relationship.
Chelsea were handed several opportunities to play Lukaku in behind on Tuesday night but very few were taken.
In order to accommodate Lukaku and play to his strengths, the Blues will likely have to accept that their main man needs to drop deep to pick up the ball and run at defenders. However, the fallout from that will mean Chelsea's wingers will have to play much higher up the pitch in order to stretch opposition defences.
It may be a chance to replicate Jurgen Klopp’s system, forcing the wide forwards higher up the pitch as Lukaku brings them into play. The switch in system could get the best out of the big man, but those around him could suffer.
If Chelsea were to copy Liverpool's ploy of allowing Roberto Firmino to drop deep and link-up play with the midfield, Tuchel would need to ask Ziyech to play a Mohamed Salah-esque role, and that's just not his game.
The former Ajax wizard plays best from a deeper role on the right-hand side, pinging nigh-on impossible balls into the final third. On the other hand, this could play right into Werner’s hands.
I’m not saying that he could be the next Salah, but he could provide an extra attacking threat by being further up the pitch and he could use his pace to terrify defences.
There are goals in this team, it's just a matter of finding a system that suits our best players. I refuse to believe that Lukaku cannot adapt to our style of play and that the entire team needs to adapt to play to his strengths.
However, it's clear Tuchel need to experiment with his frontline, we can only hope he doesn't isolate a player like Ziyech in doing so. If the Moroccan does end up being shoehorned into an unfamiliar role, Chelsea could be forced to cut ties and they'd be lucky to recoup anywhere near the £33m they paid for him.
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