Thomas Tuchel’s half-time talk to his Chelsea players was key to the west Londoners staging an epic comeback victory at the Etihad Stadium this past Saturday, according to Antonio Rudiger.
The Blues had gone behind in the opening 45 minutes through a Raheem Sterling goal but a much-improved display on all fronts helped them clinch a vital 2-1 win which allowed them to move into the third spot in the league standings.
Speaking to the club’s official website, the German international Rudiger revealed that Tuchel inspired the Chelsea eleven to play with all guns blazing in the remainder of the game which eventually proved crucial for the Blues walking away with all three points from the high-billed weekend showdown.
“It was a crazy game!
“We conceded in the last few minutes of the first half, then there was the penalty also which was saved by Edou. Then we came out for the second half and we started very strong after half-time.
“We showed a great fighting spirit. Even the players that haven’t always played that often, they came into the team against a very strong City side and they made the difference for us and this is very important because it shows we need everyone to play their part.
“Against a team like City, you can accept that they will have a lot of the ball. We were all clear before the game that we knew we would have moments where we would suffer. We went through that and kept working hard.
“Other than their goal and the penalty, I don’t think they created too much. We remained focus on our game and we always believed we could create chances of our own.
“At half-time, we were still in the game and the coach highlighted that to us. He wanted us to go out and show spirit, which we did, and we all totally believed that we could turn things around.
“They are a very strong team but they are also human, and there will be times when they make mistakes. When that happens, you have to be ready to punish them and we did that at the end with our winning goal and it was a great feeling for everyone to get this victory.”
Hakim Ziyech and Marcos Alonso were on the scoresheet for the visitors with the latter’s stoppage-time strike leaving the table-toppers Manchester City with very little time to find a leveller.
Thomas Tuchel’s side are now a point adrift of Leicester City who lost to Newcastle United over the weekend and are now in the fourth spot.
