London (AFP)

Chelsea formalized Tuesday the arrival at his head of Thomas Tuchel who rebounds barely a month after being unceremoniously fired from Paris SG, in an ambitious team but which will need his experience and his grip.

The technician has committed for 18 months "with the possibility of an extension," the club said in its statement.

"We are very happy to have attracted one of the best coaches in Europe," said the club's general manager, Marina Granovskaïa, the day after the announcement of Frank Lampard's departure.

Staying a year and a half in office, the former midfielder and emblematic captain of the "Blues" had reached 4th place in the championship, qualified for the Champions League, and the final of the FA Cup last year, at the end of a season disrupted by a ban on recruiting and by the Covid-19 pandemic.

But a poor start to the season ultimately cost him his place.

"We all have the utmost respect for the work of Frank Lampard and his legacy at Chelsea. But at the same time, I am very looking forward to meeting my new team and participating in the most exciting football championship," said delighted Tuchel, quoted in the press release.

The timing of his departure from PSG was finally almost perfect, allowing him, after only a few weeks of rest, to follow up on a great challenge.

- Thiago Silva and Pulisic, old acquaintances -

Chelsea offer Tuchel a squad with real potential, in which the club have invested 250 million euros this summer, with a good balance between youth and experience, although it is a bit light on recovery, for example .

Tuchel also arrives at the head of a team which, although 9th and on a poor dynamic - 7 points taken over the last 8 days - is only 5 lengths of the qualifying places for the C1.

In his group, he will find players with whom he has hooked atoms, like Thiago Silva, one of his base men in Paris, but also Christian Pulisic, whom he had launched in Dortmund.

His appointment is also a sign sent to the nuggets Timo Werner and Kaï Havertz who represent half of the money spent this summer by the Blues, for a still limited return.

Chelsea had decided a few weeks ago that their next coach would be German-speaking, to surf the fashion embodied in England by Liverpool coach Jürgen Klopp or the Austrian Ralph Hasenhüttl in Southampton.

Former Leipzig coach Ralph Rangnick as well as current Julian Nagelsmann had been surveyed.

Coaches with clear tactical ideas, like Tuchel, unlike Frank Lampard who, despite his glorious career as a player, remained a coach in the making.

- The bar will be very high -

After quickly making his mark in Dortmund or Paris, where he succeeded Klopp and Unai Emery, coaches known for their marked playing identity, Tuchel finds himself in London facing an almost blank sheet.

His predecessor sometimes seemed to be groping and what Tuchel lost in "historical" legitimacy within the club, he will compensate with his assertive temperament.

Renowned for his sense of detail, his whole character and his sometimes difficult relations with players or managers, Tuchel is on the bench of the Blues in the line of "dominant males" that could be José Mourinho, Antonio Conte or, in to a lesser extent, Maurizo Sarri.

He will need it to regain control of a workforce that the club has not managed to reduce, economic crisis linked to Covid requires, and where the dissatisfied (Marcos Alonso, Emerson Palmieri, Jorginho or his compatriot Antonio Rüdiger) are numerous.

In the longer term, one may wonder how much time will pass before his sometimes undiplomatic manners collide with Granovskaya, President Bruce Buck or Roman Abramovich, devoid of all patience.

The German will be the Blues' 14th coach since the end of Mourinho's first stint in September 2007.

In a club that is slightly less upscale than PSG, but in a much more competitive league than L1, the bar will be very high for Tuchel.

© 2021 AFP