Chelsea boss Thomas Tuchel praised Reece James’ performance in the Blues 3-0 away win over Newcastle.

The England international enjoyed a man-of-the-match having scored twice against interim manager Graeme Jones’ side.

The west Londoners were really struggling to hit the target but man-of-the-match Reece James broke the deadlock on 65 minutes when he picked up a cross by Callum Hudson-Odoi from the left wing and sent the ball to Darlow’s top right corner from a tight angle.

That opened the floodgates as James sealed the win for the visitors 12 minutes later from the exact same angle.

The wing-back has left his mark in a big way as he is now officially involved in more goals than any of his team-mates.

Tuchel said: “Reece is allowed to come inside, that’s not a problem. All the spaces we want to attack from, we have all the players in the spaces we want to be dangerous. So if there is a winger waiting wide, the wing-back is allowed to attack the half space.

“I think every team does this in this system. We need the wing-backs to arrive in our box to increase the chance of scoring and create goal chances.

“The first goal, it was brilliant dribbling from Callum [Hudson-Odoi] on the left side. Ruben [Loftus-Cheek] arrived, Kai [Havertz] was in the box, and this is what it takes in the end to have a rebound and a chance for a goal.

“Reece took it brilliantly. It’s a complex game and I don’t think Reece can score if Callum does do the dribbling and Chilly [Ben Chilwell] opens the space.

“We have Kai attacking the space and then Ruben. This is why sometimes our strikers are sacrificing space. We don’t need exercise shooting with Reece, he shoots like a horse”