[ad_1]
Frank Leboeuf admits he is ‘not convinced’ by what he has seen from Chelsea of late and feels N’Golo Kante and Mateo Kovacic are ‘big elements’ missing from the team.
Saturday’s 3-2 defeat at West Ham saw the Blues drop down into third place in the Premier League table, with Liverpool and Manchester City both going above them.
The result at the London Stadium – in which mistakes from Edouard Mendy played a part in two of the Hammers’ goals – has followed frustrating draws with Burnley and Manchester United.
Chelsea have suffered an extensive list of injuries this season, with Kante, Kovacic, Trevoh Chalobah and Ben Chilwell all currently out, while there are doubts over Kai Havertz and Marcos Alonso.
After being widely backed as title contenders for this season, former Blues defender Leboeuf is concerned that Tuchel’s side have dropped off from where they were earlier in the campaign.
‘Lately, I’m not convinced about what I see,’ Leboeuf told ESPN FC.
‘You can say you have players injured because that’s the truth – [Ben] Chilwell.
‘[Romelu] Lukaku just came back, we’re just seeing [Hakim] Ziyech coming back to his best but that wasn’t the case. Some others are missing – N’Golo Kante, [Mateo] Kovacic are big elements in the middle of the park.
‘I guess Mendy is maybe in a doubt, Tuchel said he has kind of a lack of confidence right now.
‘The football they play is interesting but it’s not convincing to me in the way that I don’t feel the strength that I used to see months ago.
‘Last year before Frank Lampard was sacked in November, they were first or second and people were saying, “Chelsea may be a contender”.
‘And then something happened in December time and they lost against Arsenal on December 26, and they were nowhere near it…
[ad_2]
Source : metro
