Tuchel ready to hand Kepa 'new slate' at Chelsea

Thomas Tuchel is ready to hand Kepa Arrizabalaga chances in a bid to revive his faltering career at Chelsea.

Kepa is yet to feature under Thomas Tuchel but all of that is set to change on Thursday night.

Chelsea take on Championship side Barnsley in the FA Cup, and the Chelsea boss has confirmed the Spaniard will start in goal.

The last time Kepa featured for Chelsea was against Luton, also in the FA Cup. Surprisingly, or not, he made another error in that game.

In fact, the 26-year-old’s time at Stamford Bridge has been clouded by ‘errors’ and it’s the reason he lost his place to Edouard Mendy.

Tuchel is ready to hand Kepa a new slate and believes the huge fee Chelsea paid for his services has had an effect on his performances,

Kepa will start for Chelsea in the #FACup as Thomas Tuchel says he deserves a clean slate 🙌

🗣 "I see a nice personality, an open character, a hard-working guy, with obviously a lot of quality.

"We start fresh, it's a new start for him." pic.twitter.com/g4i0rmahct
— Goal (@goal) February 10, 2021

He said to the club’s website: “He will play [against Barnsley]. From outside, of course we had a view on his situation and some difficulties on the sporting side.”

“Maybe, also, the circumstances of his transfer are a little bit on his shoulders. That was the impression from far away, from outside. ‘The good thing for him is that we start new, that this is a new start for him because I don’t have a history with him and I hope there will be no difficulties and I don’t see them coming.”

Mendy is Chelsea’s current first-choice goalie but Tuchel wants Kepa to put pressure on his Senegalese counterpart.

“We did not change the goalkeeper from the first game because Edou [Mendy] has been very strong but this is an opportunity for Kepa.”

“It’s very important for me that he does not want to over-achieve because I want him to do a normal match. He just has to show the quality that he has and give a solid performance to help the team.”