Stay up to date with notifications from The Independent

Notifications can be managed in browser preferences.

Chelsea news: Christian Pulisic backs new club to turn things around before his summer arrival

Pulisic is keeping a close eye on events at Stamford Bridge, which have seen Maurizio Sarri come under increasing pressure

Jonathan Veal
Thursday 14 February 2019 11:11 GMT
Comments
Maurizio Sarri previews Chelsea's Europa League clash with Malmo

Chelsea signing Christian Pulisic is backing his new club to come good by the time he joins them from Borussia Dortmund in the summer.

The Premier League side signed the 20-year-old for £58million in the January transfer window and immediately loaned him back to the Bundesliga leaders.

Pulisic is keeping a close eye on events at Stamford Bridge, which have seen Maurizio Sarri come under increasing pressure, particularly in the wake of the 6-0 humbling at Manchester City on Sunday, which saw Chelsea drop to sixth in the Premier League.

The winger has got faith that things will turn around in west London.

"It's tough for me to say," Pulisic said. "They've had some tough results but I know they're going to work it out. They're a great team with great players and a good coach. So they're going to figure everything out."

Pulisic got a taste of what life in the Premier League might be like during Borussia Dortmund's Champions League last-16 tie at Tottenham, though he did not enjoy it.

Spurs ran out 3-0 winners at Wembley, which makes them hot favourites to reach the quarter-finals, but Pulisic's appetite was still whetted.

"Tottenham's a great side, it's good to play against great competition in any league," he added. "But obviously I'm definitely looking forward to next season."

Such a dismal night for the Bundesliga side did not look on the cards as they dominated the first half and could easily have gone in at half-time with the advantage.

But Spurs blew them away after the break and put one foot in the last eight thanks to goals from Son Heung-min, Jan Vertonghen and Fernando Llorente.

Pulisic still thinks the situation is recoverable.

"Absolutely," he said. "This team's never going to give up, especially going home. We're confident we can score three goals, no problem. It's not going to be easy.

Pulisic was unable to stop Tottenham from winning at Wembley

"I'm not going to stand here and say we're going to win but we're going to go out, we're going to fight and we believe. That's all we can do."

On his side's second-half collapse, he added: "The only thing I can think of is we just didn't come out with the same mentality, we didn't come out with that lockdown mentality saying, 'We need to finish this game with zero goals against and we have a good chance'.

"Unfortunately we just weren't locked in on their crosses and they were able to score off three crosses, and we've got to work on that."

Join our commenting forum

Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies

Comments

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in