“I’ll drive the seven-seater bus!” Chelsea’s surreal situation
Thumbnail Photograph: Tom Jenkins/The Guardian
What Chelsea has been experiencing in the last couple of weeks is something that you would expect to read in your local newspaper about whatever low-level amateur team.
Players struggling to put together their last savings to rent a lousy van and reach the location of their next away game.
That's still not the case of Chelsea, but, paradoxically, they are getting closer to it.
Recently, we've spoken about Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich's intention to sell the team, following the sanctions perpetrated by the UK government to Russian businesspeople operating in the country.
As the club is still technically owned by Abramovich, the sanctions include the ban from selling tickets and the prohibition to spend more than £20,000 per match on travel costs.
At the moment, the club is operating under a special license.
Photograph: Tom Jenkins/The Guardian
So, will we see Tomas Tuchel and his gang hitchhiking to Lille to play the second leg Champions League last 16 second leg match against Lille on Wednesday?
"My last information is that we have a plane, that we can go by plane and come back by plane," Tuchel declared after his team's 1-0 win against Newcastle.
"If not we go by train, if not we go by bus. if not, I'll drive a seven-seater! And I will do. Mark my words I will do. I will arrive there."
Tuchel doesn't seem to have lost that inner fire that guides every young sports person chasing to make his dream come true.
"If you'd asked me 20 or 30 years ago if I would join a Champions League match at the sideline and what I was willing to do, I would have said, 'Ok, when do I have to be where?'"
"And why should this change? I will be there. We will be there."
Chelsea is set to play at Stade Pierre Mauroy, looking to move to the Champions League quarter-finals.
Last month, the Blues stooked a claim on that, sealing a 2-0 win at Stamford Bridge in the first leg.
The two goals scored by Kai Havertz and Christian Pulisic leave the team in a favorable position for Wednesday's second leg.