Barely more than a month after leaving Paris, Thomas Tuchel should already bounce back.
This Monday morning, Chelsea formalized the dismissal of Frank Lampard, unable to oppose a team yet endowed with a rich workforce.
The Englishman should be replaced by Thomas Tuchel whose first mission will be to move up the rankings: Chelsea are 9th, a place that does not correspond at all to their status and ambitions.
The arrival of the former PSG coach raises many questions.
Why did Chelsea choose Tuchel?
Thomas Tuchel was Chelsea's first choice.
The London leaders also exchanged with Ralf Rangnick and Julian Nagelsmann, the last two coaches of Leipzig whose second is still in place.
Pushed by Pini Zahavi, the agent who brought Neymar to PSG, the German has won in recent weeks.
Negotiations began before his dismissal from PSG but they focused on next summer.
Chelsea managed to convince him to come earlier, worried about the sporting situation.
The Blues love his reputation as a tactician, his relationship with Thiago Silva (whom he wanted to extend to PSG) and the fact that he can revive two German recruits from last summer, Kai Havertz and Timo Werner.
From Paris to Chelsea, is it a progression?
The answer is twofold.
In itself, yes.
Because the Premier League is more prestigious than Ligue 1 and Tuchel arrives at a club that has already won the Champions League.
But it is not certain that Chelsea are a bigger team than PSG at the moment.
It's an understatement.
Objectively, there are more chances of winning the C1 with Paris than with Chelsea, ranked among the underdogs at the start of the season and opposed in the round of 16 of the Champions League against Atlético de Madrid.
Paris, him, is declared candidate for the final victory.
What does Chelsea expect from him?
With Kai Havertz, Ben Chilwell, Timo Werner, Hakim Ziyech, Chelsea hit hard on the transfer market spending 230 million euros in 2020. Despite a 2019-2020 financial year ended with profits (+33.6 million euros ) yet with a pandemic in the middle, the Blues must imperatively finish in the top four and qualify for the next edition of the Champions League.
However, they vegetate in 9th place, with five defeats in the last eight outings in the league.
They are 5 points behind the 4th, Liverpool, a surmountable gap.
On the other hand, with 11 points to catch up on the leader Manchester United, the title seems inaccessible.
Before the season began, many had yet placed the London club among the favorites.
Tuchel must stop the fall and reinvest the summits.
Will he bounce back better than these predecessors?
Only Antoine Kombouaré, the first coach of the QSI era at PSG, is currently without a club.
His successors are all in office: Carlo Ancelotti heads Everton (6th in England), Laurent Blanc took the helm of the Qatari club of Al-Rayyan (4th in the championship) and Unai Emery returned to Spain to the bedside of Villarreal (5th in Liga).
Ancelotti, given his huge CV, has never struggled to find a place.
It was even he who left PSG for Real Madrid, against the will of the Parisian leaders at the time.
Despite his dismissal from PSG, Thomas Tuchel has not seen his reputation tarnished in the coaching market. / LP / Arnaud Journois
Dismissed, Laurent Blanc on the contrary had a terrible time to train again.
He has just come out of four years of retirement, between personal decline and positions that passed under his nose, for a return to a confidential and uncompetitive championship.
Finally, Emery returns to his first love by coaching a team of his own, that of a technician ill-suited to the big locker room, in Paris as at Arsenal.
Thomas Tuchel, him, marries the trajectory of Emery, rebounding immediately and in a great League.
At 47, he is one of the technicians of the new German generation whose name is circulating in Europe, like Marco Rose (Borussia Mönchengladbach), 44, or Julian Nagelsmann (Leipzig), even younger (33) .
Bouncing back at Chelsea is a sign that his dismissal hasn't damaged his reputation.
It is a stronghold in England and Europe, held in recent years by big names on the bench, from José Mourinho to Antonio Conte via Carlo Ancelotti.
But the hardest part begins for the finalist of the last Champions League.
It is now that his career will change.
Or he succeeds and he can still aim higher.
If he fails, like Emery, then he will fall back into smaller clubs.
What are the consequences for Olivier Giroud?
With 18 participations in matches in all competitions, Olivier Giroud has undoubtedly played more than he had imagined until now.
Frank Lampard, not finding the solution, resolved to use it.
The situation could not change with Tuchel, a great follower of different team compositions, incessant turnover and who will need, at least at the beginning, to see his entire workforce at work.
Giroud could become his Eric Maxim Choupo-Moting, the attacker he brought in the last fifteen minutes to keep or change a result.
Will he be able to recruit?
The transfer window promised to be calm this winter in London, Chelsea keeping their money to position themselves on Erling Haaland (Borussia Dortmund) next summer. The arrival of the German could be a game-changer. Any coach who arrives likes to put his paw on the workforce from the start. Tuchel is fully aware of the concerns of Gana Gueye and Thilo Kehrer, two players he brought to PSG and have since become undesirable. In Chelsea, despite the summer investment, the needs concern all areas of play.