Thomas Tuchel has named his first starting eleven as the new manager of Chelsea and, safe to say, there are a few surprises in there.
The German manager has had just one training session with his new players having been offocially confirmed as the new man at the helm on Tuesday evening, with a session taking place at 6pm last night.
Tuchel has not messed around with his first starting XI, and appears to have changed formation completely from Frank Lampard's settled 4-3-3 and has made some big calls as well.
Having featured in 80 of Lampard’s 84 games as Blues manager, Mason Mount finds himself on the bench for the German’s opening contest.
Tuchel has handed starts to his three German stars, Kai Havertz, Timo Werner and Antonio Rudiger. Werner and Havertz will be desperately hoping their fellow countryman in the dugout will give them a new lease of life in west London after barren spells since making their moves from the Bundesliga in the summer.
Centre back Rudiger starts his third Premier League game in a row as part of a three-man centre back trio alongside Thiago Silva and Cesar Azpilicueta.
Callum Hudson-Odoi starts at right wing back in a surprise move, and Ben Chilwell at left wing back, meaning Reece James has been dropped as well.
In midfield, with Mount not involved, a start is handed to Jorginho, who Tuchel wanted to bring to the PSG last year, and Mateo Kovacic.
The front three comprises of Havertz, Olivier Giroud and Hakim Ziyech as Tuchel endeavours to find out a lot about his team in ther first 90 minutes of gametime together.
Chelsea: Mendy; Azpilicueta, Silva, Rudiger, Chilwell, Hudson-Odoi; Jorginho, Kovacic; Havertz, Ziyech, Giroud.
