Romeo Lavia and Adam Armstrong led the Saints to a deserved victory at St Mary’s Stadium, inflicting Chelsea’s second defeat in their first five league games.
Raheem Sterling scored his third goal in two games to put Chelsea into an early lead, but the visitors’ dominance worryingly evaporated as the Saints cruised to victory.
Frustrated Chelsea manager Tuchel lamented two “soft, soft, soft” goals, before challenging his players to toughen up their mentality.
“We’re not tough enough to win these games at the moment, away from home,” Tuchel said.
“It’s a bit the same story as in (the 3-0 loss at) Leeds. At Leeds we thought the problem was that we didn’t score in the first 20, 25 minutes.
“They unbalanced us with two goals in two minutes at Leeds and we couldn’t find any answers.
“Today we scored, so we thought everything was fine, but set pieces again, sloppy defense again, and we’re off balance.
And today we didn’t react, we were lucky not to concede the third goal.
“We weren’t tough enough as a team to react or push ourselves to the limit for us.”
Asked to review Chelsea’s goals conceded, Tuchel continued: “Soft, soft, soft. What stops that? Stop it with pure mentality. Stop it with pure mentality.”
“There is no superiority for the opponent, there is no need to take shots, there is no need.
“Just toughen up as a team. And show the mentality. This is my assessment for today.”
“I don’t like to talk about it normally because you can’t prove it with data, body position or tactical position in defeat. But that’s how it is.
“Both goals are cheap goals, soft goals, and they shouldn’t happen if you’re hoping to win a Premier League game, a night game and an away game.
“With our demands and the ambitions we have, it is even more important if key players are missing that we need to show a different mentality.
“It is not enough at the moment to be beaten at Southampton. There is no shame in that, we are humble enough to accept that we can lose football games.”
“But it’s too easy to get us off track, it’s too easy to win challenges, it’s too easy to intimidate us.”
Southampton stayed on to toast a famous victory, with a raucous crowd reveling in flipping the winners of the 2021 Champions League.
Defender Armel Bella-Kotchap summed up the Saints’ youthful exuberance with a fine, demanding performance that delighted coach Ralph Hasenhuttl.
“When you see the physical quality he has, he’s perfect for the Premier League,” Hasenhuttl said. “And this is what we expected for the summer.
“I was more questioning if he had the right mindset, but it seems like the Premier League is very interesting for him and he is fully focused.
“The atmosphere tonight was sensational. That carried us through the last 15 minutes when we were under pressure at times.
“Everything is very positive except for a worrying injury to the biceps femoris of Romeo (Lavia), who hopefully won’t be out for long.”
Source: www.planetsport.com