'Overzealous nonsense' - Thomas Tuchel slammed over his treatment of Chelsea star

Garth Crooks is delighted to see how Romelu Lukaku has bounced back from being left out in the cold by Thomas Tuchel earlier this year.

The Belgian helped fire Chelsea to Club World Cup glory after scoring the opener in their win over Palmeiras on Saturday.

It marked quite the turn around, just over a month on from when he was dropped by Tuchel after giving an interview to Italian media expressing his frustrations at the club and discussing a return to Inter Milan one day.

Tuchel opted to drop Lukaku for a crunch game against Liverpool because the situation created ‘too much noise so close to the match.’

But former Tottenham striker Crooks still clearly doesn’t feel it was the right decision and believes Tuchel overreacted to what could have been a costly error of misjudgement.

‘I said Thomas Tuchel would need Romelu Lukaku and so it is proving,’ Crooks told BBC Sport.

‘The overzealous nonsense by the Chelsea manager in sanctioning the Belgium striker after he fell for the flattery of an interviewer in Italy almost cost Tuchel and the club.

‘Instead Lukaku apologised when other strikers of similar calibre might have put two fingers up to the manager and made for the exit.

‘All credit to Lukaku, who has knuckled down and worked his way back to form with regular appearances, which is all the £97.5m player wanted in the first place.

‘Lukaku led the line brilliantly against Palmeiras and was instrumental in Chelsea winning the Club World Cup for the first time in their history. Not a bad return.’

Lukaku’s goal against the Brazilian side took him into double figures for the season for the Blues in all competitions with the Belgian hoping to get back to his best form for the business end of the campaign.

Chelsea legend Didier