Chelsea manager Thomas Tuchel has dismissed Gary Neville’s claim that new owner Todd Boehly’s approach in the transfer window has been panicky.
It was announced on Friday that Chelsea have completed the £62m transfer of Marc Cucurella from Brighton, who became the club’s fifth signing of the summer.
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The Barcelona academy graduate follows the arrivals of Raheem Sterling from Man City (£47.5m), Kalidou Koulibaly from Napoli (£33m), Gabriel Slonina from Chicago Fire (£12m) and Carney Chukwuemeka from Aston Villa (£20m) for a total expenditure of £172m so far, with further additions expected.
Boehly has stepped into Chelsea’s chairman role and has spent the summer as interim sporting director, taking charge of transfer negotiations in tandem with Tuchel.
Neville claimed there was an element of panic to Boehly’s strategy, but Tuchel was quick to hail the “fantastic job” Boehly and co-controlling owner Behdad Eghbaline have done in the window.
When asked about Neville’s comments, Tuchel replied: “Panicking? No, I would describe it as super hard-working and learning while new on the job.
“So it’s pretty much going on, new ownership and then stepping into the transfer market is probably one of the toughest things you can do when coming from outside.
“But I have nothing but the biggest respect and compliments for both Todd and Behdad.
“I don’t know when they sleep, maybe they never sleep.
“But we have a very honest, very open, very direct line of communication and the transfers so far speak for themselves.
“We have a delay of course, we had the delay because of the sanctions and the sanctions led to the loss of key players.
“But like I said, both of the owners are involved in the daily business, they are doing a fantastic job so far and the transfer market speaks for itself.”
Chelsea are not planning to stop after signing Cucurella and are thought to be in the market for a new striker after Romelu Lukaku returned to Inter Milan on loan.
In a surprising development, the Blues have been linked with ex-Arsenal man Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang in recent days.
Tuchel enjoyed a successful time together with the striker at Borussia Dortmund but is adamant that talk of him joining Chelsea is just “pure speculation”.
“We will not comment. There are a lot of names out there. It’s pure speculation and we will not get involved.”
