It might be tempting to watch Cole Palmer dismantle Premier League defences this season and wonder exactly what Thomas Tuchel was thinking. The little first-time flick into Joao Pedro to score against Fulham and his own piercing finish under Bernd Leno. The surge of acceleration before wrapping the ball past Brighton’s Bart Verbruggen from 20 yards. The intelligence to drift to the fringes where he could burst around Hull’s defence and tee up Joao Pedro for another.
How did Tuchel not take this player to the World Cup? The answer, of course, is that this player didn’t really exist last season. The timing of Palmer’s dip in form was impossibly cruel. He racked up 42 goal contributions for Chelsea in 2023/24 and produced 32 more in 2024/25. But those figures dropped to only 14 goal contributions in 2025/26, including just two in the final 12 games of the season.
