‘When he’s confident he’s as good as anyone. Fantastic player, great feet and he seems to always pick the right pass. He’s a defender’s nightmare.’
He added: ‘Really intelligent player but he’s getting up to speed. He’s had his illness, his injuries, lack of playing, but when he’s fit and playing well and confident this is what he can do.’
Joe Cole, too was enamoured with what he saw from the England international, noting that he was ‘fantastic’ at time in southern Germany.
The second player to catch Crouch’s eye on the night is Chelsea’s top scorer in all competitions Nkunku, who struck his 11th of the campaign on Thursday night, but has largely struggled for minutes in the Premier League.
The Frenchman opened the scoring, and had a good night in front of goal in general, his link up play with Marc Guiu, Sancho and Mudryk was smooth for the majority of the game, although he did miss a decent chance to double his tally before getting injured.
As such, former England and Liverpool striker Crouch felt that the player was perhaps unfortunate not to be a more regular feature in Maresca’s first-team plans at this point of the season.
‘It’s a beautiful finish, in these areas he’s so calm and he’s so unlucky not to be playing because he’s a fantastic player,’ claimed Crouch.
