Daily Star journalist Paul Brown is concerned that Christian Pulisic may struggle to get regular time at Chelsea this season due to Thomas Tuchel's tactical setup.
What formation does Tuchel tend to play?
Since taking over from Frank Lampard at Chelsea back in January, Tuchel has almost exclusively used a 3-4-2-1 formation.
This system has worked well for the club as they have won the Champions League and UEFA Super Cup with the German coach at the helm, losing just five of the 37 games that he has been in the dugout for.
What did Brown say about how Tuchel's formation might affect Pulisic?
Pulisic has featured 79 times in all competitions for Chelsea since he joined the club back in 2019 for £58m.
Brown fears that he might not get many opportunities to add to that tally this season, though, due to his tendency to stay out wide, whereas Tuchel prefers to play two central attacking midfielders behind a lone striker.
Speaking to GIVEMESPORT, Brown said: “I wonder how much they can use Pulisic really, because he’s more of an out and out winger, and now that they’re playing with 10s, that might mean his minutes are limited more than the others.”
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Can Pulisic be a regular starter at Chelsea this season?
It appears that Tuchel does have his preferred pairing of No. 10s at the moment in the shape of Mason Mount and Kai Havertz.
This duo started the games against Arsenal and Liverpool recently, arguably Chelsea's toughest two games on paper so far this term, while they were also chosen to play in the Champions League final in May when the Blues edged past Manchester City.
However, Pulisic did play from the beginning in seven of Chelsea's final eight league matches in 2020/21 and he was also handed a starting berth when Tuchel's men took on Crystal Palace on the opening day of the current campaign. This suggests that he is still at the forefront of Chelsea's plans for the moment.
He has missed the team's last four games thanks to a combination of illness and injury, so he may need to be eased back into action upon his return. For now, though, it appears that he does have a role to play, and given that Chelsea are set to be competing in four competitions, he ought to still fancy his chances of getting a reasonable number of minutes under his belt this year.