Aston Villa legend Paul McGrath has slammed Chelsea’s decision to sack Thomas Tuchel and appoint Graham Potter who doesn’t have the pedigree of the German coach.

McGrath who happens to be a boyhood Chelsea fan was surprised that Chelsea didn’t go for Mauricio Pochettino or Zinedine Zidane who are both free agents at the moment.

McGrath wrote for the Sunday World: “I hope, for the future of the club I supported as a boy, that this decision does not backfire badly on Chelsea.

“All those players who came to Chelsea in the summer on the basis that Tuchel was in charge – Raheem Sterling, Kalidou Koulibaly, Wesley Fofana and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang to name but four big transfers – must be wondering what on earth is going on.

“So now Graham Potter is handed the reins of the Chelsea chariot.

“I didn’t warm to him at Brighton, at first, as he had taken the job of my good pal Chris Hughton who I felt was treated terribly by the club.

“But good luck to the Englishman, I now admit he has done a fine job at Brighton, despite the financial realities meaning he had to sell his best player every summer.

“He has probably multiplied his salary fivefold by going to Chelsea. Can you blame him for making the switch?

“But is he just there so that he will listen to his bosses in the boardroom as much to his own football brain when players need to be bought and sold?

“When you are Chelsea and you need a manager, it behoves a club that were European Champions last year and are World Club Champions to get nothing but the best.

“And right now ‘nothing but the best,’ in terms of available managers, meant either Zinedine Zidane or Mauricio Pochettino.

“Instead of going for either man who are free agents, Chelsea paid, it is believed, a total of £22 million to loosen Potter and his coaches from their Brighton contracts. It makes no sense to me.”