Chelsea extended their unbeaten run in all competitions to nine games under Thomas Tuchel after playing out a goalless draw against Manchester United at Stamford Bridge. Despite having the better chances when compared to Man United, Chelsea couldn’t trouble De Gea for most parts of the game.
Ole Gunnar Solskjaer
Callum Hudson-Odoi’s handball incident in the first half drew controversy after VAR dismissed claims of penalty, much to the dismay of Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and his team. The Norwegian insisted in his post-match interview that his side should have been awarded a penalty. Speaking to BBC, the Norwegian said “It was a penalty, 100% nailed on.”
“If that’s a natural position for a hand to be in when the ball comes in then I must be blind.”
“We wanted to win. Apart from the last quality or pass being not good enough… we had great pressing, desire, work-rate.There was a great save by David de Gea and we got the clean sheet.“
“That’s what let us down, that quality on the ball. The first half was scrappy. Poor game really. But then we played some good stuff at times. When we settled we created a few chances but we didn’t have enough.”
“It was a good block by Luke Shaw. That’s what you do when there is a goal to be saved, you put your body on the line. I thought we were excellent defensively.”
Thomas Tuchel
The Chelsea Head Coach said that the decision by VAR to not award a penalty was correct, and added “How can this be a VAR intervention? The player in red plays the ball with the hand and then we are checking for a penalty? Why does the referee have to see this?“
“I’ve seen it on the iPad, I don’t understand why the referee has to check it but I’m glad it was no penalty. That would make it even worse.“
Tuchel admitted he was happy with his team’s performance, and said “It was a high quality game between two very strong teams. We suffered in the first half but overall it was an even game. In the second half I thought we were really strong.”
“I thought we were closer to winning it, but there was a lot of quality on the pitch. Performance-wise I’m satisfied. We defended very well in the last line and I’m very happy with that.“
“We were not good enough in the first half to attack the spaces. To find the solution was not always easy and we lost a bit of confidence with some easy ball losses.”
“We said at half-time not to worry. We changed to a 5-3-2 to have higher ball recoveries and to regain confidence, and the boys did that very well. We were very close to winning.”
Football is my antidote 