Chelsea manager Thomas Tuchel has admitted he made a tactical mistake as his team suffered a first-leg defeat to Real Madrid in the Champions League.
Karim Benzema scored all three of the visitors' goals in a 3-1 victory, becoming the first player to score a European hat-trick against the Blues in the process. The 34-year-old also set a record for goals scored by a French player in a single Champions League or European Cup season, after Just Fontaine's high mark had stood for more than 60 years.
Tuchel was disappointed in the levels shown by his team, who failed to recover after a weekend Premier League defeat at home to Brentford. However, the German was also willing to take some of the blame himself for how he lined his team up defensively.
"Yeah, it’s my mistake," Tuchel said after the game, after being asked about leaving Andreas Christensen to deal with Vinicius Jr. "We changed the formation and wanted to turn things around because I think personally there was enough where we could hurt them."
Tuchel moved Reece James deeper after the break, with his team 2-1 down. However, despite what the manager admitted was "a big mistake" to allow Benzema to complete his hat-trick, he refused to blame a single player for the outcome.
"It’s like always, it’s never on one player, it’s never on two players, it’s on all of us, I’m included in this," he said. "Like I said, individually we lost shape and sharpness and obviously since the international break we don’t look the same."
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It was Vinicius Jr who got free down the left to lay on the first goal for Benzema, before the former Lyon man headed in a second from a Luka Modric cross. Kai Havertz halved the deficit, but Benzema made it 3-1 moments after the restart after an Edouard Mendy error.
Chelsea have now conceded seven goals in two home games since the international break, and had similar woes last season. On that occasion, they were beaten 5-2 at home by West Bromwich Albion directly after the March internationals, but were able to recover to beat Porto in Europe days later.
"[It was] one of the worst first halves I’ve seen from us at Stamford Bridge," Tuchel admitted. "At this level you cannot play like this, individually and a team, from all of us it was not enough. We were not doing what we are used to do, it was far from our standards.
"Everything, when we pass, where we pass, attacking, possession game, the intensity and desire to win challenges, how we closed spaces. The first half was so far from any standards we set ourselves that we cannot complain when we lose like this."
