Trevoh Chalobah’s bravery helped has Thomas Tuchel solve his latest dilemma, and in doing so, the 22-year-old has passed Jose Mourinho’s personality dynamics test.
The Cobham graduate suffered a ‘horrible’ injury following a collision with Naby Keita in Chelsea’s Carabao Cup final against Liverpool at Wembley on Sunday.
Despite dropping to the floor in agony and eventually undergoing surgery in the changing rooms, Chalobah persevered, proving pivotal towards the Blues‘ success in nullifying Jurgen Klopp’s red arrows.
However, it wasn’t until Tuchel stressed the severity of the former England youth international’s pain before the centre-half raked in the plaudits for his courage.
On Tuesday, the Blues boss revealed that Chelsea’s medical staff performed ‘surgery’ on Chalobah, stitching up his wounds.
“I could not believe what I saw after the match. There was surgery literally in our dressing room, and I am not joking,” Tuchel said.
“They were stitching him up. I could not believe it. After the match, after the press conference when I left they were doing the stitches, I just heard him scream. It looked horrible.
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“I went in and saw it, it looked horrible, and I could not believe he played one more minute with this kind of injury, but he played the rest of the match and scored a penalty – he was very tough, and he has my full respect.”
Chalobah’s valour is to behold and would have certainly won the respect of Mourinho, who has an infamous reputation for his attitude towards injuries.
From shamming Chris Smalling and Luke Shaw at Manchester United for refusing to play through an injury or mocking Sergio Ramos in a tedious spout over players’ physical limits to labelling Oscar ‘a fragile boy.’
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The Portuguese boss expects his players to play through the pain and bleed a little more – play through the pain.
“They have to be resilient. They have to be professionals. They have to be team players. They have to understand the team needs,” said Mourinho.
“They have to go to the limits. They have to play with small injuries. They have to play with pain, play with fatigue because there is no other chance.”
Tuchel can be sure now that Chalobah can pick up from where Andreas Christensen left off, as the Dane looks to have edged ever closer to leaving Stamford Bridge in the summer, as per Fabrizio Romano.
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