London: Chelsea coach Graham Potter faces a crucial 90 minutes when his side entertains Dortmund in their Round of 16 second-leg match in the Champions League Tuesday night.
Chelsea need to overcome a 1-0 defeat from the first leg in a game where they were arguably the better side, but failed to take their chances and were caught by a late sucker punch by Dortmund.
A 1-0 Premier League win at home to relegation-threatened Leeds United Saturday helped lift some of the pressure off Potter, but overturning a 1-0 deficit to a top-level European rival will be a different challenge, reports Xinhua.
Saturday’s win was Chelsea’s first since a 1-0 victory at home to Crystal Palace January 15, with the goal in that game coming from a set piece. Saturday’s winner also came following a set piece, with Chelsea only scoring one more goal in the six matches between the two wins against Palace and Leeds.
That should highlight where Chelsea have problems, and despite Saturday’s win, patience with Potter has worn thin among Chelsea fans, who booed him during the 1-0 home defeat to Southampton a fortnight ago.
With the club spending 300 million pounds in the January transfer market to bring in players such as Enzo Fernandez and Mykhailo Mudryk, Chelsea’s owners need to see some return on that investment in the form of goals, and an exit in the first knockout stage of the Champions League could see their patience with Potter come to an end.
Tottenham are in Champions League action Wednesday as they also need to overturn a 1-0 first-leg away defeat against AC Milan.
It has been a bad week for Tottenham, who were knocked out of the FA Cup to second-tier Sheffield United a week ago, before slipping to a 1-0 defeat away to Wolves Saturday.
Antonio Conte needs Harry Kane to be at his best, but with Richarlison, Son Heung-min and Arnaut Danjuma all available, he will be confident his side has the firepower to overturn their first-leg defeat.
IANS
