Thomas Tuchel says Romelu Lukaku has upset 'calm and focus' at Chelsea

Thomas Tuchel has made it clear to Romelu Lukaku that his rumblings of discontent are not helping Chelsea get their season back on track — and he should know better.

Tuchel’s team were struggling with injuries, Covid and four wins in 10 Premier League games when an interview emerged in which £97.5million star-man Lukaku was pining publicly for a return to Inter Milan.

‘I don’t like it because it brings noise we don’t need,’ said Chelsea’s head coach, as he prepared for Sunday's game against Liverpool.

‘We need a calm environment and focus, and it does not help. On the other side we don’t want to make it more than it actually is.

‘This is today’s world, and everything you say is out there in public if you are such a big player like Romelu, — he is an experienced player and should know what kind of value it has when he speaks out like this.’

Lukaku’s interview was broadcast by Sky Sport Italia on Thursday.

He said he was ‘not happy with the situation at Chelsea’, that the head coach ‘has chosen to play with another system’ and that he would one day return to Inter.

Tuchel said it was all news to him and promised to clear the air.

‘You will find not a lot of system changes, if any,’ said the Chelsea boss. ‘Romelu played when he came, he got injured, caught Covid and he played with no training.

‘That’s why I’m surprised. I don’t enter in these discussions like there’s something going on because there is absolutely zero going on.’

In part two of his interview, released on Friday night, Lukaku said he turned down Manchester City in 2020 and that he didn’t want to leave Inter.

‘When I was at Inter, at the end of the first year, I turned down an offer from Manchester City which was higher than Chelsea’s this summer,’ Lukaku said. ‘I did it because it had only been a year, it wasn’t the right time to leave and I didn’t want to.

‘I was in a deep hole at Manchester United, things weren’t going well.

I was a big investment for Inter but we did great things together. I went to speak with club chiefs and asked for a new contract but they didn’t want to extend my contract.

‘So I told myself that there is only one team where I could possibly see myself — Chelsea. I wasn’t thinking about going there, but they came in for me and so I asked (boss) Simone Inzaghi to leave. ‘If Inter offered me a new contract, I would have stayed 100 per cent.’