Tuchel on why he fought Conte

The London derby game between Chelsea and Tottenham all went the wrong way for both Thomas Tuchel and Antonio Conte, and now Tuchel has revealed what really happened.

Both managers had gone into a scuffle the minute of an equalizer to the first half lead by Chelsea new signing, Kalidou Koulibaly, and then continued at full time when both men refused to let go of each other’s hand when they engaged in a tight lock after final whistle.

And now, the Chelsea boss reveals it was due to the fact that his Spurs counterpart, Conte refused looking him in the eyes during the post-match handshake.

Speaking to Sky Sports on the incident, Tuchel revealed:

“I thought when we shake hands you looked in each other eyes, he had a different opinion. It was not necessary but a lot of things were not necessary. There was no problem.”

Tuchel said when asked why both managers were booked after their clash following Spurs’ first equalizing goal.

On his choice of celebration after Chelsea had restored the lead, the manager explained;

“In the middle I thought I should not do this but sometimes a match gets you and this one really sucked me in. It was pure joy, it may offend our opponents but they did the same.

“There are no hard feelings. I feel like it was a fair tackle from him (Conte) and a fair tackle from me. We did not insult each other, we did not hit each other, we are fighting for our teams.” He said of the incident.

Speaking of what became the bone of contention that resulted in the chaos, Tuchel expressed his desire to wanting Tottenham’s goals canceled.

“Both goals should not stand. Only one team deserved to win, that was us. I don’t know how many tactical fouls Hojbjerg and Bentancur did today. Since when can we pull hair in a football match? They checked and nothing happened, absolutely ridiculous.”