On Wednesday night, in the FA Cup round of 16, Chelsea visited Championship side Luton, and although the home team took the lead twice, the Blues still relied on Saul Negus, Timo Werner and Lukaku to win 3-2 and advance to the quarter-finals.
The Blues made a big rotation this time, and among the players who played 120 minutes, only Antonio Rudiger still started. In the goalpost position, Kepa has the opportunity to get the right place; the three-man center-backs are Marang Sal, Ruben Loftus-Cheek and Antonio Rudiger; Robert F. Kennedy and Hudoi are the wing-backs; Saul Neggs and Jorginho play double backs; Mason Mount and Timone Werner support Lukaku.com.
Just two minutes into the opening, the home team made a good part of a corner attack, maran Sal lost the opposing centre-back Rees Burke, giving the latter a beautiful headstick to give the home team an early lead. The Blues quickly lost ground after falling behind, and Mason Mount intercepted the ball in midfield and launched a counterattack, passing to Timo Werner in front of him, the German international intended to get up but made a mistake, disguised as Saul Neggs behind him, who chased the Blues to a draw. However, before the end of the game, the home team once again took the lead due to the Blues' defensive errors, and Marang Sal once again lost his hand on the counter-attack, giving the opposing shooter Harry Konick a one-handed opportunity to shoot through the attacking Kepa to give the home team a second lead.
Behind, Thomas Tuchel made two moves, put away a pair of poor wing-backs, and replaced them with youth youngsters Xavi Weir and Christian Pulišić, which achieved good results. In the 68th minute, A precise long pass from The cheek found Timo Werner, who scored with one shot and equalised for the visiting team. In the 78th minute, Cheek's diagonal pass found Timo Werner, who burst in from the right, who dropped a cross and let Lukaku shovel in front of the ambush to break the goal and push Chelsea forward. As a result, the Blues also scored a goal to beat Luton 3-2 and advance to the quarter-finals of the FA Cup.
It is understandable that the Blues have declined in form with a full-cast and a boss selling out, but the performances of several players are far from what expected. First of all, the worst is definitely the interim captain of this game, Jorginho, in the face of adversity, the captain should have stepped forward, but he was the one who led the soul, almost none of the forward passes in the whole field found a teammate, and it was quite reasonable to be replaced in the middle of the second half. Left-centre-back Marang Sal's performance in this game is also "hellish", with both goals conceded due to his personal mistakes, first a corner leak, and then a defensive counterattack to "pack offside", and the slow turn also allowed the opponent to get a one-handed chance. There is still a lot of room for improvement in his air supremacy and defensive positionality, so he will be better at cameoing as a full-back who focuses on single defence than at centre-back. Robert F. Kennedy's performance is not too satisfactory, but after all, this game is his first time in four years for the Blues, and if he makes a cameo in a wing-back position that he is not familiar with, there will be less criticism of his performance.
However, the team still had a lot of surprises this game, such as the impressive performance of Ruben Loftus-Cheek, who made a cameo appearance at centre-back. His height advantage and ability to use the ball are evident in this position, and although he has made slight mistakes in one-on-one defense, he is impeccable on the offensive end. His long passes, his steering ability is very strong, he also has the ability to break through with the ball, and the team's second and third goals are all due to his instigation, maybe he can really find a piece of the sky in this position. Saul Neggs also played a masterpiece in this game, in the case of Jorginho's big loss, he single-handedly supported the entire midfield line, his back-up burst into the goal, long pass, straight line, long shot, scramble can have a hand, I don't know if the performance of this game will make his Blues career have a turnaround. Timo Werner also handed over one goal and two assists this game, but in fact, his overall performance is not particularly good, and his attempts to break through many times and cooperate with his teammates are not very successful, but I hope that these three goals can help him find his confidence faster.