MAURICIO POCHETTINO has urged Chelsea fans not to expect Christopher Nkunku to instantly solve his team’s problems as the France forward prepares for a possible debut in Tuesday’s League Cup quarter-final against Newcastle.
The 26-year-old has not yet played competitively for the club after injuring his knee on their pre-season US tour, weeks after joining from RB Leipzig for £52 million (€60 million).
Nkunku, last season’s Bundesliga top scorer, was named in Pochettino’s squad for Saturday’s 2-0 win against Sheffield United as the team registered back-to-back Premier League home wins for the first time in more than a year.
He did not feature but is set to make his competitive debut on Tuesday for Pochettino’s side, who struggled to break down their opponents at the weekend.
“I can tell you maybe he can play 20 minutes,” the Chelsea boss said at his pre-match press conference on Monday. “How I saw him before Saturday in my mind I had one percent to two percent of doubt. That’s why I didn’t want to take a risk.
“I need to be 100 percent, then things can happen.”
Chelsea have scored 28 goals in 17 league games this campaign, but they have come in bursts, with the team, 10th in the Premier League, failing to net at all in the league during September.
Pochettino urged supporters to show patience with their new forward, who scored 16 goals for Leipzig last season.
“(Nkunku has trained) only in the last few weeks, after four or five months he was out,” said the Argentine. “The team has evolved and the situation has changed.
“My worry is to put too much pressure on him, to say ‘now has arrived the guy to make us win every single game, to change everything’. I don’t believe it’s going to be like that.
“He needs time to recover his fitness. Hopefully he’ll play tomorrow and score three goals, then be consistent. But the most important thing is not to put too much pressure on him.”
Nicolas Jackson is the top-scorer for Chelsea this season, with eight goals in all competitions, while the impressive Cole Palmer and Raheem Sterling each have six.
Newcastle boss Eddie Howe hopes his team can draw on the disappointment of losing last season’s League Cup final against Manchester United.
“I’m just devastated we didn’t get over the line in the end,” he said.
“I think it’s helped us for this year and we know this game’s going to be very difficult but we know the prize if we can get through.”
The Chelsea match at Stamford Bridge will mark Howe’s 100th game in charge of Newcastle since he was appointed in November 2021.
“I’ve loved every second of it,” he said. “When you look back at a group of games, so many highlights, memories.”
Who backs Delaney tho’ ? For such a small & beautiful country we accept a very low standard & we pay the wrong people way too much.
Delaney is a gormless plank,put into the FAI by his ticket tout father
Far from gormless.
Figure out how he can be removed from office, who has to agree to it and who pays their wages.
Nothing gormless about that.
Ah who cares, Trap is still manager. Just have to get used to it till he’s gone. COYBIG !!
Too little too late, both Delaney and Trapp are stuck in a greed warp, unconscionably high salaries and selling Irish soccer short. Under their stewardship, a cancer is taking hold of Irish football that is going to end up setting us back decades.
To appease fans, the big news is that Trapp is attending a match in England today – says it all that this is news. Delaney should go for giving this has been a new long term unaffordable contract before the Euros and Trapp should have been fired. Upcoming friendlys should be boycotted. €150,000 pa is more than enough to pay the FAI head.
Thats even too much for Delaney to be honest,he shouldn’t be there,look at the state if the irish league!!
Sick of the same news recycled by the press everyday about Trap , he’s the manager so let’s move on and back him up during the qualifiers because if we don’t do that we’ve no chance of getting to the world cup.
Trap and Delaney are symbolic of FG and Labour. Only concerned about bondholder payments to themselves.
What?
We hava gooda mentality and a gooda team.
If only.
That Delaney fella is some ass clown, he should have stepped down after the 33rd country comment after the French match, 450k a year for making comments like that. But sure why step down if your signing your own checks. His stupid head suits Irish soccer in fairness, annoying!!
Wolfgang do u read your comments before you post them??
No, why do u?
Sports administration at the highest level in any sport is all political and John Delaney is the consumate politician. No matter how you do the sums we cannot afford for Trap to go with bankrupting the FAI finanacially, so you might as well get used to having Trap until the end of the road for us at WC 2014 however soon it comes to an end for us.
look at the head of tardelli looks like he is hiding something from trap..I smell a rat!
Lol looks like he’s just farted and Trap’s just got wind of it!
LOL. Spot on Mac.
How much do the Irish government contribute toward the FAI either in direct subsidies or in tax breaks, allowances, advertising on pitches, employment grants, ticket purchases, the list goes on. Transparency please as their are people hungry in Ireland while Delaney is bleeding the system for pension and expenses plus his salary. How much will his pension cost as I think he will live to be 100 in spite of us all.
Trap should join Fianna Fail
So John delay gets paid 360000 a year , amount cut in fai grant aid to local clubs last year 370k , how are we still paying so much for such bad leadership and organisation?? A symbol of everything that’s wrong with country at the moment..