Tuchel “wanted to be from Barça” and sees it easier to train Lukaku “than Mbappé or Neymar”

Thomas Tuchel was one of the protagonists of the Festival dello Sport organized by The Gazzetta dello Sport in Trento and tomorrow, the pink newspaper magazine Sports week will reveal several anecdotes from his Italian days. Today the media advanced some details of the report, revealing that the coach had lunch with Arrigo Sacchi and Marcello Lippi, “turning glasses into players.” The German recounted having grown up “cheering on Matthäus at Inter and fearing Sacchi’s Milan”, which became one of his references.

Photo of de Kylian Mbappe

Tuchel, yes, dreamed of “being a top player, or at least one of Barcelona’s”, but in the end his fate awaited him on the benches. He defined PSG and Chelsea as “two teams in the antipodes by style and organization”, since, in Paris, he served more “as minister of sport” than as a coach, “also managing family and friends of the stars.” “It is easier to train Lukaku than Neymar or Mbappé,” he said.

Neymar's photo

At Chelsea, on the other hand, he can work “in a calmer way”, applying his working methods, “with elements of philosophy due to his studies and the meeting with Hans Ulrich Gumbrecht”. With Sacchi he analyzed the Milan of Gullit and Van Basten, with Lippi the management of great players like Zidane, and the future of the beautiful game. In addition, Tuchel spoke of the Champions League meeting with Juve de Allegri after the 1-0 in the first leg: “You learn a lot from defeats …”