Timo Werner showed he is still important to Chelsea – Thomas Tuchel

Thomas Tuchel hailed Timo Werner for proving he still has a Chelsea future with a hard-fought brace in the Blues’ 6-0 thumping of Southampton.

Werner claimed a perfect hat-trick of sorts, by striking the left post, right post and crossbar at St Mary’s Stadium on Saturday.

But the 26-year-old kept his cool and delivered a telling double as Chelsea shook off leaking seven goals in two defeats to smash the sorry Saints.

Werner has been linked with a move away from Chelsea this summer, and had only managed one Premier League goal before Saturday’s south coast romp.

The hard-working forward has refused to give up on his Stamford Bridge situation however, leaving boss Tuchel delighted with his latest response.

“Timo was playing in his favourite position, and he loves to play with Mason Mount, Kai Havertz and Mateo Kovacic,” said Tuchel.

“He has a connection to these players. He loves the double striker position, the half left position.

“It was an opponent where we could imagine we’d find spaces in behind because it was a higher attacking opponent.

“Everything was set out for him to deliver, honestly.

“It was for him to show that he’s still an important player for this group and that’s exactly what he did. It was necessary, strong but necessary.”

Mount bagged a brace for himself to add to Werner’s double, with Marcos Alonso and Havertz also on target.

Chelsea compounded last weekend’s 4-1 humbling by Brentford by slipping to a damaging 3-1 Champions League quarter-final first-leg loss to Real Madrid at Stamford Bridge on Wednesday.

Tuchel held lengthy talks with his players on Thursday in a bid to hit back to form, and the response was both telling and immediate.

A delighted Blues boss praised his players for rediscovering