Christian Pulisic returned to English Premier League side Chelsea injury-free and would up playing a key role in the club’s road win over Leicester City on Saturday.
Pulisic delivered the final dagger in Chelsea’s 3-0 victory over Brendan Rodgers’ side, coming off the bench to score in his first match back from U.S. men’s national team duty. It was a lively substitute appearance from the 23-year-old, who came close to scoring prior to his goal in the second-half.
The Blues raced out to a 2-0 first-half lead thanks to goals from Antonio Rudiger and N’Golo Kante, providing Thomas Tuchel’s side even more freedom to attack after halftime. Pulisic was subbed onto the field in the 62nd minute, and didn’t have to wait long to team up with fellow substitute Hakim Ziyech.
Ziyech dribbled his way into the box from the right wing and laid off a pass to the streaking Pulisic. The USMNT star provided the final touch past Kasper Schmeichel, before celebrating with his teammates as Chelsea walked away with a ninth league victory of the season.
Pulisic also had one assist and a second goal waived off due to offsides from his teammates, taking away what could’ve been an even more special afternoon for the returning attacking player. Chelsea overall had three goals waived off in the second-half due to offsides, letting the Foxes off the hook from an even-worse defeat at the King Power Stadium.
Chelsea returns to Champions League play on Tuesday at Stamford Bridge against Juventus, looking to exact revenge for a Matchday 2 loss in Turin.
Everybody trying to make reality like it’s a Fifa video game. You can play player A in the position he plays for his club but that moves player B into a different role. Change formation so player C can be comfortable but now player D and E are unsure. Even within formations there are vastly different tactics ManCitt uses the 4-3-3 to possess the ball, Venezia uses the 4-3-3 to absorb pressure and break on the counter. We’ve got 6 matches left, we need to stay with what we’ve got. It was pretty good against Mexico and CR. Once we’ve qualified we can experiment with a second formation. But can we please bring DeLaTorre, Nico, Hoppe, Konrad, and maybe Tessmann.
It’s tempting to see if Pulisic could work as a false 9; anything to keep Musah and Reyna on the field together and on the same side.
Played as the #9 for most of his time, before sliding out wide.
Very interesting, that..
I don’t think he’ll be there long for Chelsea with Werner almost back and Lukaku returning shortly as well. If you’re going to try Ferreira as a 9 why not Pulisic, but I don’t think Christian will get a lot of long term work there for Chelsea to hone his craft.
i’ve suggested it for a few years now on a “Landon Dempsey” argument. we have many 9 prospects. if they aren’t fully cooked, swap in the best fully cooked scorer we have, even if he’s not a stereotype 9. i’d rather have that than sargent or pepi struggling.
we need some people up there who show to ball, get touches, can finish, and maybe even have some breakaway capability. he has it. he was paired up there with zardes for chile. then play reyna behind him as 10. best of the remaining AMs as the 8, adams as the 6. miles and zimmermann CB, steffen or turner keeper. that’s a good spine……
That seems like an incredibly offensive lineup for you IV. It would seem to solve the issue with CPs over dribbling in the wing position. At least yesterday he pretty much just acted as a poacher and did little showing back to the ball. Berhalter mentioned as an option last camp so who knows.
Getting Pulisic healthy, and staying healthy is critical for the success of the USMNT. With Pulisic we’ve got strong wide attacking options off the bench (Aaronson & Hoppe). Without Christian we struggle beyond the starters.
Getting a balanced attack from both wings is instrumental for the USMNT. Weah has shown that with his pace & abilities that teams are going to have account for him or get punished. With Pulisic on the opposite side teams will have to open up just that little bit more….giving extra space for either an overlap by the backs or a channel for McKennie/Musah/Reyna (if Gregg will ever play him there) through the center.
You seem to be either forgetting or ignoring Weah who seems to be continuing to improve. I think it’s going to be hard to keep him out of the lineup.
He literally said “Weah has shown with his pace and his abilities that teams are going to have to account for him or get punished.”
When everyone is healthy, my preference would be to have Pulisic & Weah as the wide attackers in a 4-2-3-1 formation with Reyna as the CM. This would effectively move Musah to the bench, but IMO it gets our best players on the field in their best positions.
This also gives us impactful subs off the bench or alternating starts in tournament play (Musah, Aaronson, Busio, Konrad, etc…). IMO the only thing we’re missing is a viable back-up to Adams at the CDM position and a coach with a real understanding of talent. Gregg appears to be getting better; since he didn’t field Lletget or Roldan; but until he stops calling them (and Arriola) into camp I still question his ability to evaluate talent.
move reyna in where he plays club and go with weah and morris wide right. if not morris, dest moore musah etc. people think i am being negative but it’s really more i think we have so much talent but need to shuffle it around and pick the right ones until it really hums. this is a decent set of players recently but it’s not yet humming. IMO we need a more precise central element and more pure speed wide. a more direct attacking element into the front of the box instead of take it to the flag. we then need a really good set of 9s who finish chances like dempsey used to.