LONDON — Thomas Tuchel secured his first win as Chelsea manager as his team beat Burnley 2-0 in the Premier League thanks to goals by Cesar Azpilicueta and Marcos Alonso on Sunday.
After beginning his tenure with a 0-0 draw against Wolverhampton at Stamford Bridge on Wednesday, Tuchel again saw his Chelsea players dominate possession against another team that struggles to score goals.
They finally found a cutting edge this time, though, as Callum Hudson-Odoi ran at the Burnley defence on the right before setting up Azpilicueta — on the overlap — to smash a rising shot past goalkeeper Nick Pope in the 40th minute.
Hudson-Odoi struck a deflected effort against the post early in the second half as Burnley struggled to get out of its own half, before Alonso collected a short pass from substitute Christian Pulisic and powered a volley in off the underside of the crossbar in the 84th.
Chelsea climbed to seventh place but the opposition will get tougher for Tuchel, with his next game at Tottenham on Thursday.
Tuchel, who replaced the fired Frank Lampard on Tuesday, appears ready to give every member of Chelsea’s large squad a chance to stake a claim for a starting spot. After making a raft of changes against Wolves — and also switching formation to 3-4-2-1 — he tinkered again by restoring Timo Werner, Mason Mount, Alonso and Tammy Abraham to the lineup and leaving out playmaker Hakim Ziyech from the matchday squad altogether.
The German coach seems settled on a three-man backline of Azpilicueta, Thiago Silva and Antonio Rudiger, while Jorginho and Mateo Kovacic have started both games under Tuchel. The other places in the team look up for grabs, though.
Mo Salah’s pair of goals leads Liverpool past West Ham
LONDON — The goal drought that symbolized Liverpool’s ailing title defence is over for Mohamed Salah.
After six games without a Premier League goal, Salah showed his vision and touch in netting twice in a 3-1 victory over West Ham on Sunday.
After a demoralizing slump for the team and the star striker, back-to-back 3-1 wins have been reeled off inside 70 hours after Thursday’s triumph at Tottenham.
Now Jurgen Klopp’s side is up to third, four points behind Manchester City, ahead of hosting the leaders next Sunday after midweek games.
This wasn’t the type of swaggering performance that produced a 7-2 thrashing of Crystal Palace when Salah last found the net in the league. But the strength of the second-half performance when grappling with a shortage of centre backs shows why it was misguided to prematurely rule Liverpool out of the title race.
It was the arrival of Curtis Jones from the bench in the 57th minute _ a substitution that visually perplexed James Milner _ that provided the impetus to break the deadlock.
After only 34 seconds in the game, the 20-year-old midfielder’s pass set up Salah to curl past goalkeeper Lukasz Fabianski.
Milner, who had seemed to question Klopp’s substitution, seemingly apologized to his manager.
The burden was lifted and Liverpool was liberated. That was clear in the breathless counterattack leading to the second in the 68th minute.
From a West Ham corner, Trent Alexander-Arnold cleared with a long ball switching flanks to Xherdan Shaqiri, who crossed high over the top of the defence into the penalty area. There, the unmarked Salah brought the ball down with one touch before slicking clipping a shot into the net.
It took just seven touches from the breakaway to scoring. Liverpool could relax, especially after Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain and Roberto Firmino combined to set up Gini Wijnaldum for the third in the 84th.
On a day when West Ham provided little attacking threat and slipped out of the top four, only Craig Dawson’s late header from a corner breached Liverpool’s goal.
Leicester misses chance to go 2nd with loss to Leeds
LEICESTER, England — Leicester missed the chance to move above Manchester United into second place in the Premier League by losing 3-1 at home to Leeds, for whom striker Patrick Bamford scored one goal and set up the other two on Sunday.
Marcelo Bielsa’s Leeds recovered from conceding the opening goal of the game to Harvey Barnes in the 13th minute by equalizing two minutes later through Stuart Dallas and adding goals after halftime from Bamford and then Jack Harrison on a counterattack.
Bamford now has 11 goals this campaign and is starting to dispel his reputation as a wasteful finisher. His goal against Leicester was excellent, collecting the ball after being played in on the left of the penalty area and smashing a fierce shot into the far top corner.
It was only Leicester’s second league loss since Nov. 30 and kept Brendan Rodgers’ team in third place — when it could have moved two points behind leader Man City.
